News

NCETA are very pleased to announce their success on winning a NHMRC Medical Research Future Fund (MRFF) grant to deliver a project on ‘the power of parents: co-designing health communications to reduce adolescent drinking’. The project will be funded for four years commencing 1 July 2024, in conjunction with the Chief Investigators and Associate Investigators.

Professor Jacqueline Bowden and her research team have been awarded more than $945,000 to work with parents and adolescents to develop ways to better inform them about the impact and dangers of supplying alcohol.

Alcohol is the leading individual risk factor for death and disability in 15–24-year-olds globally. Parents have an important role to play in protecting teenagers, setting boundaries and clear expectations about drinking alcohol.

The research project will enlist the aid of parents and their teenagers to design and test communication materials, such as videos for social media, or television and online information, to support parents and discourage them from providing alcohol to their children.

“Data shows that parents are supplying drinks to their teenagers in the mistaken belief that it is building a responsible relationship with alcohol.  Unfortunately, the evidence shows that, on the contrary, it can increase drinking and the associated harms among young people,” she says.