'Fan Can' Controversy Calls Attention to Concerns About Binge Drinking on College Campuses

By Hugh C. McBride

College students and alumni are rarely shy about proclaiming their allegiance to their school, a predilection that is not lost on the countless purveyors of university-branded shirts, hats, bumper stickers and myriad other forms of memorabilia (including, in the case of some high profile schools, logo-branded coffins -- really!).

But as students prepare to head back to campus for the start of the 2009-2010 academic year, one new form of university-related merchandising tie-in has caught the eye and raised the ire of several watchdog organizations, legal experts and many schools themselves.

In August, Anheuser-Busch announced that it will begin distributing Bud Light in specially designed "Fan Cans," which will be emblazoned in color combinations that are closely associated with a number of prominent college football teams.

'Categorically Unacceptable'

Though the cans won't feature school names or team logos, the effort is clearly designed to appeal to aficionados of certain schools. Scarlet and gray cans will be sold in Columbus, Ohio, home of the Ohio State Buckeyes, while Ann Arbor, Mich. -- home of arch-rival Michigan Wolverines -- will receive Bud Light in maize and blue cans.

As John Hechinger reported in his Aug. 21 Wall Street Journal article, much of the criticism of the "Fan Can" promotion centers on implications that Anheuser-Busch is using team loyalty to encourage underage drinking:

Many college administrators contend that the promotions near college campuses will contribute to underage and binge drinking and give the impression that the colleges are endorsing the brew. ... With students returning to campuses and the fall football season approaching, the "Fan Cans" are also renewing the debate over the role of beer makers in encouraging college drinking. ...

Samuel L. Stanley, president of New York's Stony Brook University and a medical doctor, also objected. In a letter to Anheuser-Busch, he called the campaign "categorically unacceptable." Stony Brook recently launched a national program called Red Watch Band, which seeks to harness school pride and "positive peer pressure" to discourage heavy drinking. The school says it was motivated by the death of a professor's son from alcohol poisoning in 2008, when he was a freshman at Northwestern University.

The promotion has also drawn harsh words from at least one influential U.S. government official. In an Aug. 27 Los Angeles Times article, Jim Peltz reported that a senior lawyer with the Federal Trade Commission has expressed dismay with the beer company's marketing effort.

"We've told them we don't ever want to see a campaign like this again," FTC lawyer Janet Evans said in an Aug. 26 interview. "We're concerned about the promotion because it's targeted to college campuses where there are a large number of binge drinkers and underage persons in the audience."

A Continuing Problem

Though Anheuser-Busch claims that the "Fan Can" campaign is targeted toward men and women of legal drinking age, the promotion's obvious connection with college football has brought renewed public attention on the continuing problem of excessive drinking on college campuses.

The website of the U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) provides the following statistical snapshot of binge drinking among adolescents, teens and college students in the United States:

• Binge drinking usually begins around age 13, tends to increase during adolescence, peak in young adulthood (ages 18 to 22), then gradually decrease.
• Binge drinking during the past 30 days was reported by eight percent of youth ages 12 to 17 and 30 percent of those ages 18 to 20.
• Among persons under the legal drinking age (12 to 20), 15 percent were binge drinkers and seven percent were heavy drinkers.

The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) defines binge drinking as "a pattern of alcohol consumption that brings the blood alcohol concentration (BAC) level to 0.08% or above. This pattern of drinking usually corresponds to 5 or more drinks on a single occasion for men or 4 or more drinks on a single occasion for women, generally within about 2 hours."

Though adolescents and teenagers are obviously not immune the dangers of alcohol abuse, binge drinking seems to be particularly problematic on college campuses, SAMHSA reports:

• In 1997, the Harvard School of Public Health reported that almost 50 percent of surveyed college students said they had four or five drinks in one sitting within the previous two weeks.
• Binge drinking has been reported by 86 percent of college men who live in fraternity houses and 80 percent of women who live in sorority houses.
• In a recent study, 39 percent of female college students and 50 percent of male college students said they had engaged in binge drinking within the two weeks prior to being surveyed.

The Dangers of Binge Drinking

Many people believe that alcohol abuse and binge drinking are little more than phases or "rites of passage" among young adults. But studies indicate that even though these behaviors are most common among young people, the effects of binge drinking and other forms of alcohol abuse can extend deep into adulthood.

A June 2 Reuters Health article reported that researchers with the University of Wisconsin-Madison have noted a significantly greater risk of injury among college students who engage in extreme drinking, which the scientists defined as eight or more drinks in day for men, and five or more drinks in a day for women:

The fact that heavy drinking often leads to accidents and injuries is no secret, but the findings show that the risks continue to "grow rapidly" the more students drink, according to Dr. Marlon P. Mundt and colleagues.

"These are the students at high risk for injury," the researcher added. "Quantities alone, or frequency of consumption alone, do not show the whole picture ... A drinking pattern of frequent extreme intoxication is key, as it escalates injury rates rapidly."

Perhaps even more troubling, an Aug. 11 Los Angeles Times article indicated that binge drinking by college students has been associated with cognitive abilities later in life.

Reporting on a study that was conducted at the University of Santiago de Compostela, Galicia, Spain (and which was published on the website of the journal Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research), the Times noted that during tests taken while they were sober, young binge drinkers performed worse than non-drinkers on tasks related to attention and memory skills.

In a news release that accompanied the study report, co-author Alberto Crego emphasized that the destructive effects of binge drinking are not limited to those who engage in long-term alcohol abuse or who are afflicted with alcoholism

"We found that healthy young university students -- meaning those with no alcohol use disorder, alcohol dependence or associated psychiatric disorders -- who engaged in binge drinking showed anomalies during the execution of a task involving visual working memory, despite correct execution of the task, in comparison with young non-binge drinkers," Crego said.