earticle

영어

Objective: Recently women's drinking has increased in Korea. This study was conducted to investigate the changes in alcohol consumption of female university students and their drink-related behavior. Methods: The study focuses on these changes over a decade using self-administered questionnaire surveys and health examinations that were carried out for female university students in an area of Korea in 1999 and in 2009. Results: A total of 60.3% of the students in 1999 and 75.5% in 2009 responded that they drank alcohol (p<0.01). Increases in the frequency of alcohol drinking and alcohol drinks in single sitting were found (p<0.05). The drinking behavior of the students was mostly influenced by their friends/peers in both years. Significant change was found in their preferred type of alcohols (p<0.05), although the most preferred alcohol of the respondents was so-ju (Korean native vigor) in both years. Their preferred type of food accompany drinking was significantly changed (p<0.001). No significant difference in the amount of alcohol drinking both of underage drinkers and of-age drinkers was noted between the two years. Heavy drinkers in the 2009 population had significantly higher blood pressure than non-drinkers and/or moderate drinkers (p<0.05). This study indicates that the proportion of drinkers, opportunities of alcohol drinking have greatly increased compared to 10 years ago and there might be a rise in binge drinking among drinkers including underage students. Conclusions: The results of this study suggest that alcohol-blood pressure associations are considered to be of concern even in young females. This study also suggests that there is the need for gender-specific alcohol prevention programs or campaigns to intervene the drink-related behaviors of female students.