The majority of empirical work on adolescent use of alcohol has been done in animals, given ethical constraints in performing such studies in human adolescents. Animal models of ethanol also provide the most evidence for differential effects of alcohol in adolescents relative to adults and are consistent with human findings of adolescents having relative insensitivity to ethanol effects. Spear and colleagues have shown that adolescent rats relative to adults, are less sensitive to the social, motor, sedation, acute withdrawal and “hangover effects” of ethanol 101–103. These findings are significant in that many of these effects serve as cues to limit intake in adults 11. Likewise, at the same time when adolescents are insensitive to cues that may help to limit their alcohol intake, positive influences of alcohol such as social facilitation may further encourage alcohol use 104. Most risky behaviors in humans- including alcohol abuse- occur in social situations 23, potentially pushing adolescents towards greater use of alcohol and drugs when this behavior is valued by their peers.
