Who pays for the drinking? Characteristics of the extent and distribution of social harms from others’ drinking

Abstract

Relatively minor harms from others' drinking are experienced quite frequently. The social victims of others' drinking tend to drink heavily themselves, yet in contrast to what characterizes social consequences of own drinking, we find that the burden of social harms from others' drinking is to a larger extent carried by women than by men.

Harm from others’ drinking: How problematic do people with and without experience of harm perceive it to be?

“…Seen in the light of the literature on harm from others' drinking (Laslett et al, 2011;Moan et al, 2015;Rossow & Hauge, 2004;Storvoll et al, 2016), the findings add to previous research, showing that those most at risk of being harmed perceive harm from others' drinking as less problematic than those less at risk. For instance, persons not living with their partner and younger persons (Bellis et al, 2015;Laslett et al, 2011;Moan et al, 2015; Storvoll are more likely to experience harm et al, 2016), but seem to be more tolerant of harm from others' drinking.…”

“…Furthermore, younger persons are at greater risk of experiencing harm from others' drinking than older persons (Bellis et al, 2015;Laslett et al, 2011), and persons not living with a partner are at greater risk of experiencing harm than those who do live with a partner (Moan et al, 2015;Storvoll et al, 2016). With regard to education, findings are ambiguous; while some studies suggest that persons with lower education are at increased risk of experiencing harm from others' drinking (Storvoll et al, 2016), other studies report the opposite pattern: that persons with higher education are at increased risk (Rossow & Hauge, 2004).…”

“…Similarly, own drinking is associated with experience of harm from others' drinking, with more frequent drinkers being at increased risk of experiencing harm than less frequent drinkers (Moan et al, 2015;Rossow & Hauge, 2004;Storvoll et al, 2016). In this study, those who drank to intoxication more frequently perceived it as less problematic that someone experiences being kept awake at night by drunken people.…”

“…However, it seems plausible that factors associated with risk of experiencing such harm, e.g. age, gender, education, partner status and own drinking (Huhtanen & Tigerstedt, 2012;Moan et al, 2015;Rossow & Hauge, 2004;Storvoll et al, 2016), are also associated with tolerance for collateral damage from others' drinking.…”

Collateral damage from alcohol: implications of ‘second‐hand effects of drinking’ for populations and health priorities

“…Several terms have been used to describe the impacts of alcohol to those other than the person doing the drinking: they include social consequences [8], externalities [9,10], victimization [11,12] and second-hand effects [13]. While the scope of these terms is not identical, a common theme is that damage or social harm from the use of alcohol includes not only that experienced by the drinker, but by others, be they heavy drinkers [12] or non-drinkers [10], including the fetus.…”