Why is youth alcohol consumption falling? A mixed methods investigation of changing drinking cultures across recent generations. (360G-Wellcome-208090_Z_17_Z)

Alcohol consumption has fallen sharply among young people in the UK, leading some newspapers to label this generation ‘the new puritans’. Despite comparable trends being reported in Europe, North America and Australia, we know little about why this transformation is happening, which young people are drinking less, whether youth drinking is concentrating in particular high-risk groups, whether new inequalities are emerging, how these changes relate to wider youth culture, and what the implications are for public policy. The project addresses two questions: 1. In what ways has youth drinking changed over recent decades and have these changes varied across the population? 2. Do changes in alcohol’s position within broader youth culture help to explain the fall in drinking? Focusing on 11-24 year-olds in England, we will use innovative trend analyses and internationally-unique survey data to examine the changing characteristics of youth drinking occasions and the shifting relationships between youth health and leisure-related activities. Qualitative interviews with four age cohorts will further investigate changes and continuities in youth drinking practices and their connections to other activities. The results will contribute novel insights into how positive trends in youth drinking can be reinforced and the re-emergence of negative trends can be curtailed.