Have you ever read the Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs? I haven't either, but, according to Business Week, the May issue of the medical journal says they questioned 3,600 middle school kids about a bunch of things and then came back two years later and asked the same questions again.
What they discovered was that 3 percent of the kids who said their parents never let them watch R rated movies drank alcohol while 19 percent of the kids who did watch R rated movies drank alcohol.
For those of you not here in the United States, an R rated movie is one where if you are under the age of 17 and go to the movies to see it you have to be with a parent. Of course with cable and NetFlix and downloads, those restrictions only work at the movies.
To me, this isn't about R rated movies and it shouldn't be treated as such. I think it is about parents who take an interest in their child and who are watching over them. What they forget to say is that 81 percent of the kids who watch R rated movies don't drink. The movies have nothing to do with it. I think 19% of the kids probably have two parents who probably have to work to make a living and also the fact that high school kids sometimes drink. I know. Shocker. If they were interviewed in 8th grade, it means they were in 10th grade the second time around. I know a lot of kids who drank in 10th grade. Hell, I knew kids in 10th grade who were making moonshine when they were in the 10th grade.
Am I wrong? Is this about the movies? If I let a 15 year old child watch Hurt Locker are they going to start hitting the bottle? I watched R rated movies in middle school and high school but my parents didn't know. I would just sneak into those movies when I was supposed to be watching some PG flick. And yes, I started drinking in high school. I blame parents not having locks on their bars and people not carding me not a movie I watched.
Totally agree, Enty. Classic correlation/causation.
ReplyDeleteThe first R-rated movie I ever saw was The Piano when I was twelve...talk about jumping in headfirst! SO MUCH FULL-FRONTAL NUDITY!
Ooh, do I sense a future Your Turn?
It seems line an arbitrary association. I wasn't allowed to watch R rated movies but I still did and I drank too. My mom was pretty strict but not over the top.
ReplyDeleteI think there is so much that is being left out of this study. It is phrased to say that their parents don't let them watch R rated movies, not that they don't. You also have to consider that sometimes middle school kids don't tell the truth (which could mean more or less drink). Also, how many kids who don't watch R rated movies and don't drink go completely wild when they graduate from HS? There are too many variables.
I don't really drink, but I watched R rated movies when I was in grade 8, so that stat is flawed. They should have done a cross variable correlation to really see if there was a relationship.
ReplyDelete*pushes glasses up*
I can only imagine how hard it is to be a parent today is. There is a way to access violence and porn from so many forms of media. Parents just do the best they can.
ReplyDeleteThe nature vs. nurture debate can never really be solved.
I think it's deeper than that. Parents who let their kids watch R movies are more lenient and less strict than those parents who don't.
ReplyDeleteI'm not blaming parents (I have a 16 yr old) but it's a thought.
It's all about parental supervision...knowing where you kids are and who they are with and whether the other kids' parents are supervising too. With parental supervision of the right kind, there won't be drinking and the watching of age-inappropriate movies. And it doesn't matter if both parents work or not.
ReplyDeleteI don't drink and my parents never restricted me about watching R rated movies, both at the cinema or at home, they always were very upfront with stuff like that.
ReplyDeleteI think the enviroment (family and friends) are more important than watching some movie and following the actor footsteps. Also the most important one, peer pressure.
Kate has it exactly right. Just because two facts are correlated doesn't mean that one causes the other.
ReplyDeleteI also always question any survey that focuses on a minority percentage. What about the 81% of the kids who aren't drinking? Why not focus on the statistic that represents four out of every five people instead?
In almost every case of a study that doesn't quite make sense why the results have been skewed one way and not the other, it's interesting to take a look at who sponsored the study.
ReplyDeleteThanks Enty. I will now be locking up my booze. You made me remember raiding my parents liquor cabinet when I was young, and now my son is just about at that age.
ReplyDeleteI'm a researcher and good researchers NEVER talk about causation. :) Like RocketQueen said, you have to look at who sponsored and actually administered the survey.
ReplyDeleteI've also watched R-rated movies for as long as I can remember. We used to listen to George Carlin tapes in the car on family vacations. I don't drink and neither does my brother.
Sort of OT, but if you were born about when I was (1965), do you now have the same fully stocked liquor cabinet all the grown-ups had when you were a kid? All the men on Dynasty and Dallas always had a glass with brown liquid and ice cubes in hand. I thought it was soooo glamorous, and I couldn't wait to do it myself.
ReplyDeleteNow, though, we never keep anything stronger than beer and wine in the house (with the exception of some limoncello sitting in the fridge, the product of a cocktail experiment gone horribly wrong. Damn you Giaadaa DeeeLauurrennntissss!)
I watched R rated movies when I was younger. We had HBO, Cinemax and Showtime, so all of those shows, movies were available to watch. My parents weren't sticklers and pretty much let us watch whatever we wanted. But I didn't drink until I got to college. Depending on who actually gave the study these things tend to lean toward whichever they are trying harder to prove.
ReplyDeleteI'm with Andrew. I think it has more to do with the leniency of the parents involved. I'm horrified at some of the parents in my area. They have parties for their children that involve drinking and it's seen as "just fine because we are there supervising them". I call bullshit on that. To me, it is just enabling the problem of teenage alcohol consumption.
ReplyDeleteI think watching R-rated movies and drinking are not closely related. Parents guide their children with different levels of strictness. Just because a parent is lenient enough to let a child watch an R-rated movie, it doesn't mean the parent is lenient (or careless) enough to let a kid drink. This study was just another way for the organization to introduce controversy and to get teen drinking into the news again,
ReplyDeleteI had good parents who were very fair, and had very high standards for me, which made it very hard for me to drink and watch R rated movies as a teen, but I still found a way. While I was still a rebellious teen, I was very careful not to get caught or get into trouble or let my grades drop while in high school and college. So, I think their good parenting paid off. Kids with bad or indifferent parents don't give a shit about getting caught or anything else.
ReplyDeleteI don't think my parents ever gave a crap about any movie I watched as a kid. My friends and I would watch the worst scary movies full of tits and ass and bad language, no big deal. And I never drank until I left high school. Stupid study pulling out causation when there's barely correlation.
ReplyDeleteIt also seems implied that a 10th grader watching R-rated movies or drinking is bad. But I don't think either is bad in and of itself. R-rated movies are just movies, and if the kids are brought up right, they understand that what they're watching isn't reality.
ReplyDeleteSame with drinking - having a couple of beers is fine if you're a teenager. We've all done it. It becomes a problem when teens drink to self-medicate or when they drink and drive. But I am all for responsible teen drinking.
I firmly believe it's the parents' responsibility to make sure their kids know how to navigate potentially dangerous situations, not to completely restrict them. Because then, once the kids goes to college or moves out, they are overwhelmed with negative stimuli and have a hard time dealing with it.
Sorry for the book!
Saw my first R rated movie when I was 20 years old.
ReplyDeleteDidn't drink alcohol til I was about 31 years old.
Life got hard, work got stressful; movies didn't have anything to do with it.
I think this study was skewed to show what the "researchers" wanted it to show.
My first R-rated movie was when I was 6 years old. However, I didn't start swearing until I was 19, didn't drink until I was 20, and have only touched one (unloaded) gun in my whole life. The movies have nothing to do with it; it's how one is raised and the environment around them that decides drinking. Silliness, again.
ReplyDeleteIt is complete silliness... my family was not big on labels, we watched everything and anything.. my parents even encouraged us to have a drink at home so we wouldnt "try anything stupid" when we are out with our friends.. i turned out ok :) no major issues or screwups.. its just the environment on how the child was raised..
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