A survey of third-level students suggests that their lifestyle is not as bad as we might have thought.
Campus.ie’s annual national student survey suggests that students are moving away from the debauched lifestyle we all like to imagine they live.
When it comes to smoking, they’re not all puffing away outside the library – three in 10 are, which is about the national average, according to last year’s HSE stats. In the nationwide survey of 4,583 students in Ireland conducted by Campus.ie, seven out of 10 students describe themselves as “not regular smokers”.
About half say that they only drink between one to six drinks a week, with 10 per cent saying they do not drink at all. Of those who do drink, 80 per cent of students are under the weekly maximum units recommended by the Health Service Executive (up to 11 for women and up to 17 for men), according to responses to this study.
Health
Most (59 per cent) students party once a week, with a quarter claiming they don’t go to parties or clubs at all. When they do go out, students are spending an average of €22.13 on alcohol on a night out.
Drug use is not at epidemic proportions, according to this study – two students in three claim never to have taken drugs at all. Among the third of students who have taken drugs, about a quarter have tried hard drugs with the remainder ’fessing up to smoking marijuana.
One in five students surveyed is not sexually active, they report. A further fifth of respondents said that they had one sexual partner and another fifth claim to have slept with from two to five people. Only 3 per cent of the sexually active group admit to not using contraception.
The researchers at campus.ie see all this as evidence that Irish students are wising up and lowering their health risks, but despite this, they say, all is not rosy on Irish campuses.
Source: Louise Holden, Irish Times, 28/08/14
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