Abstract

Alcohol consumption by teenagers is a serious problem of public health. The aim of the present paper was to review the research of antialcohol interventions aimed to promote antialcohol attitude. In teenagers, serious alcohol related adverse consequences are aggravated mental, emotional and sexual development, high risk of alcohol dependence, etc. In youngsters the spread of alcohol use is favored by several factors. The most important among them are sensation seeking, inexperience in social coping, low self-esteem, home situation and drinking of parents. In antialcohol education, both prohibitions and information on alcohol risks are recommended. More recently, attention has been paid to social competence, improvement of emotional intelligence and teaching of the tactics how to refuse adults’ proposals to drink. Testing of the elaborated intervention programme has revealed a significant variability of results. Obviously, the didactic mastering of teachers is essential. However, in several cases the improved knowledge of alcohol risks was not accompanied with changes in alcohol related behaviour. Mostly, intervention programme had a short-term positive effect but did not generate long lasting antialcohol attitude. Consequently, systematic antialcohol education is necessary, as well as seeking for new approaches to effective antialcohol intervention.