Ah, jelly shots. Where would the teenage house party be without that rainbow spectrum of wobbling shot glasses? The E number-ridden concoction of Glen’s vodka and brightly coloured gelatin to bridge the gap between children’s party food and the adult world of hard spirits.
While we may think of the jelly shot as a harmless, if slightly embarrassing fixture of our youthful drinking days, new research shows that the beverage may have wider reaching—and slightly more sinister—effects.
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According to a report published in earlier this year in the Journal of Child and Adolescent Substance Abuse, all that spirit-soaked jelly being knocked back by minors could be linked to higher rates of binge-drinking and violent behaviour.
Surveying 1,031 people across the US aged between 13 and 20 years old, researchers at Boston University asked questions on jelly shot consumption over the 30 days preceding the study. Twenty percent of those surveyed admitted to having drunk a jelly shot, with later questioning revealing that this group also drank significantly more in general.
Those who consumed jelly shots were also found to drink alcohol 2.2 days more per week than those who didn’t. The average number of alcoholic drinks consumed per month for jelly shot fans stood at 30.9 drinks, compared to 18.8 drinks for non-consumers. Researchers also found that violence while drinking was more prevalent in underage jelly shot consumers, with 18.7 percent of the group saying they had gotten into a physical fight, compared to just 9.5 percent of those who managed to resist the shots’ wobbly allure.
While the researchers noted that their findings do not prove a conclusive link between underage jelly shot consumption and becoming a violent, drunken mess, the study’s lead author Dr. Michael Siegel said in a university press release that “specific interventions to address this consumption may be warranted as part of the effort to reduce risky alcohol use among youths.”
Your brain and liver might be fucked from using that fake ID too many times but at least now we’ve grown up and gotten a little more classy in our alcoholic beverage choices.
Aperol Spritz jello shot anyone?
