After the booze comes the hangover: a perspective of alcohol consumption in young.

Abstract

Until today, little relevance has been given to the main cause of alcohol consumption related morbidity in young population, the so called "the next day morning alcohol hangover". The hangover is defined by the presence of symptoms connected to excessive alcohol consumption and its total metabolism, with severity enough to disturb responsibilities and daily life activities. Numerous observations show us that generally the young populations tend to be involved in a series of behaviors to cope with the unpleasant effects of a night of immoderate alcohol consumption. Through an empirical evaluation, it will be argued in this study the circumstances implicated in alcohol hangover and which behaviors the young population normally tends to be involved in order to attenuate it. The sample comprised 134 university students (1º year). It can be concluded that the frequency of the behaviors to cope with alcohol hangover translates the need to remove or alleviate in an accurate and symptomatic way the most reiterated effects of aversive alcohol hangover cluster. This work provides reliable information that could be employed from an educational point of view, while we profound which cognitive, behavior and physiological mechanisms occurs during an episode of alcohol hangover. Taken into account that the consumption of alcoholic beverage is a normative behavior in adolescence, we propose a realistic perspective of the phenomenon (more than ideological and utopic), that encompass the maximum delay of the beginning of alcohol consumption in young, educating them in what concerns the potential harm of its consumption, incorporated in a broad perspective of promotion of an healthy life style and of proximity with the adolescent.