Binge Drinking More Common in Co-Ed Housing
November 17, 2009 -- Research by Brigham Young University social scientists suggests co-educational housing on college campuses could lead to self-destructive behaviors: co-ed residents are nearly 2.5 times more likely to binge drink on a weekly basis than their counterparts in single-sex housing.
"These findings indicate there might be a different normative context when young adults men and women live together and when they live in gender-specific housing," said Jason Carroll, an associate professor in BYU's School of Family Life. "This is a call for further investigation."
Carroll's study, based on surveys of 500 students at five American campuses, none of them in Utah, will be published today in the Journal of American College Health . The key finding is that 42 percent of those in co-ed residences reported binge drinking on a weekly basis, compared with 18 percent of those in single-sex housing. Binge drinking is defined as consuming four or more drinks at once, or imbibing with the intent of getting drunk.The researchers investigated whether other factors could explain the difference. But age, religiosity, impulsivity and relationship status didn't matter."On all those factors we saw no significant difference between populations," Carroll said. "It strengthens the possibility that housing environments can have a causal impact on student behavior."
The findings are significant because co-ed housing makes up more than 90 percent of residential options at the country's 50 largest academic institutions, Carroll said.
The researchers also found greater use of pornography and more permissive attitudes about sex among those in co-ed housing. These students were also more likely to have had three or more sex partners in the past year.
The surveyed students were at two public universities in the Midwest, another on the West Coast, a large East Coast private university and a religious school. The research did not identify the schools. The students all lived in university-sponsored housing. What makes these findings compelling for Carroll is that they shed light on the possible consequences of the shift toward co-ed living on U.S. college campuses. The trend has occurred in step with the decline of the doctrine in loco parentis since 1980, said Carroll, referring to the notion that universities should act as parents, working to shape students moral and ethical development. BYU is one of the nation's few institutions still squarely footed in the old camp. "This shift has occurred with little investigation of its outcomes," said Carroll, who hopes to build on the research with longitudinal studies that could establish causal relationships. |
