at this point are purely speculative, made with a degree of bias that alcohol must be having a deleterious effect. Thus, we have to be cautious when attempting to interpret differences between groups. Animal studies are one important avenue that can help inform interpretation of human data.5Small samples and multiple tests. As seen in Table 2, Table 3, while some studies have relatively large samples (e.g., Thayer et al., 2013), most have quite limited sample sizes (e.g., Ns < 20). In addition, several studies conducted numerous tests, without clear delineation of their multiple comparison correction. We have thus opted to be conservative in drawing conclusions from each study individually, and instead focus upon generalized patterns across studies.6Culture-specific studies. With notable exceptions (e.g., Fein et al., 2013; Xiao et al., 2013), most studies in this field originate from a small number of research settings in the US. Thus, replication across other research laboratories in other countries is a critical next step to evaluate the robustness of these findings across other regions.7Age considerations. These studies were all evaluated with adolescents (defined as ages 19 and under). Therefore, caution is warranted in extrapolating results to older age groups (emerging adults, adults). Because the
