Wastin´Away in Margaritaville? New Evidence on the Academic Effects of Teenage Binge Drinking

Using data from the National Longitudinal StudyIn a longitudinal study, researchers conduct several observations of the same participants over a pe... of Adolescent Health, this study examines the relationship between teenage binge drinking and three measures of academic performance: grade point average, out-of-school suspensions, and unexcused absences from school. While ordinary least square estimates show that binge drinking is associated with diminished academic performance, individual fixed-effects estimates suggest that much of this relationship can be explained by unmeasured heterogeneity. After controlling for individual fixed effects and for changes in drug use, psychological well-being, and time preference, binge drinking has a much smaller and often statistically insignificant effect on school performance.