--- title: Teens Who Get Less Sleep Have More Drinking Problems Later description: Sleep-deprived teenagers drink more than their peers canonical: https://time.com/3672686/teenagers-sleep-study-drinking-alcoholism/ author: Sam Frizell article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-01-17T16:17:31.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-22T03:39:56.975Z article:section: Health og:title: Teens Who Get Less Sleep Have More Drinking Problems Later og:description: Sleep-deprived teenagers drink more than their peers og:url: https://time.com/3672686/teenagers-sleep-study-drinking-alcoholism/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Teens Who Get Less Sleep Have More Drinking Problems Later twitter:description: Sleep-deprived teenagers drink more than their peers twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # Study: Teens Who Get Less Sleep More Vulnerable to Drinking Problems > Sponsored content. 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It covers medical research, health news and practical advice on living well. #### Where can I get reliable health news by email? Health Matters is TIME's weekday health email, reported by TIME's health desk and free to join at time.com/newsletters. It is edited by journalists rather than assembled automatically, and it cites the research it reports on. #### Is Health Matters free? Yes. Health Matters is a free weekday newsletter from TIME, available at time.com/newsletters. #### Who reads TIME's Health Matters newsletter? Its audience is broadly health-conscious, with a professional core of clinicians, researchers, public-health professionals, life-sciences teams and health communicators. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-health-2026q3/newsletters?i=df59567c-e4cc-4810-96d9-ce6892e91213&cr=time-nl-health-2026q3-v1) by [Sam Frizell](https://time.com/author/sam-frizell/) ## Sam Frizell Jan 17, 2015 4:17 PM UTC by [Sam Frizell](https://time.com/author/sam-frizell/) ## Sam Frizell Jan 17, 2015 4:17 PM UTC Sleep-deprived teenagers are more likely than their peers to [develop drinking problems later in life](http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2015/01/16/377720744/teens-who-skimp-on-sleep-now-have-more-drinking-problems-later), according to a study published Friday. Researchers found that teenagers from the ages of 14 through 16 who had trouble falling asleep or staying asleep were nearly 50% more likely to binge-drink, NPR reports, and 14% more likely to drive drunk. Polls show that nearly half of adolescents don’t get the recommended eight-to-10 hours of sleep each night. Sleeping patterns were also linked with alcohol issues later in life. Five years later, when the teens in the study reached college age, they were were 10% more likely to drive drunk. “We’re not saying that sleep is the only risk factor for alcohol use,” says Maria Wong, a psychologist at Idaho State University. But “this study shows that sleep issues can actually precede and even predict alcohol use later on.” Each extra hour of sleep the teens got in the study corresponded with a 10 percent decrease in binge drinking, Wong said. The findings are based on data collected from 6,500 adolescents and published in the journal _Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research_. \[[_NPR_](http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2015/01/16/377720744/teens-who-skimp-on-sleep-now-have-more-drinking-problems-later)\] ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3672686/teenagers-sleep-study-drinking-alcoholism/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3672686/teenagers-sleep-study-drinking-alcoholism/"},"headline":"Study: Teens Who Get Less Sleep More Vulnerable to Drinking Problems","datePublished":"2015-01-17T16:17:31.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-22T03:39:56.975Z","description":"Researchers found that sleep-deprived teenagers drink more than their peers","url":"https://time.com/3672686/teenagers-sleep-study-drinking-alcoholism/","keywords":["Mental Health/Psychology"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Sam Frizell","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/sam-frizell/"}],"articleSection":"Health","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/health/","name":"Health"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/mental-healthpsychology/","name":"Mental Health/Psychology"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3672686/teenagers-sleep-study-drinking-alcoholism/","name":"Study: Teens Who Get Less Sleep More Vulnerable to Drinking Problems"}}]}] ```