Drunkorexia refers to the tendency of college students to indulge in risky behavior on college campuses. Earlier it was predicted that drunkorexia affects only a limited number of students, however, a new study predicts that the practice might be far more common than previously thought.
The risky behavior associated with drunkorexia is characterized by students who exercise intensely or skin meals before drinking or purge deliberately. Generally, the idea of such students is to increase the buzz caused by alcohol or to reduce the number of calories.
The survey, conducted by a team of researchers at the University of Houston has found that out of 1200 students who have had at least one bout of heavy drinking in the last one month, 8 in every 10 students showed a risky behavior associated with drunkorexia. Some of these risky behavior practices include skipping food completely before drinking, consuming laxatives and inducing vomiting.
In fact, the researchers also discovered that this type of behavior was not just limited to females. Male students were as likely to engage in behavior linked to drunkorexia as their female counterparts. Lead researcher Dr. Dipali Rinker believes that this might be because men have the greatest tendency to indulge in risky drinking behavior than women.
The complete details of the study were recently presented at the Research Society on Alcoholism's annual meeting in New Orleans.
