Getting Wasted: Why College Students Drink Too Much and Party So Hard

Vander Ven (sociology and anthropology, Ohio U.) conducts a sociological investigation of alcohol use on university campuses through analysis of a qualtitative survey of 469 drinking stories, a couple dozen intensive interviews, and field research at bars and parties. The analysis focuses on the collective strategies, rituals, and motivations of alcohol consumption and their impact on the self and social relations. Vander Ven pays attention to the ways in which drinkers find pleasure in drinking and associated behaviors, an issue he finds to be neglected in the literature, as well as to more commonly discussed negative impacts and how they are responded to socially. Annotation 穢2011 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)