Children who before their peers learn to speak and read more often become alcoholics. This is explained by their great thirst for new experiences and sensations, or so it is stated in an article published in the journal Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research
“Experiments with alcohol, as a rule, are a kind of social norm among youth. It is therefore not surprising that individual differences both in behavior and in mental abilities (ability to speak) are associated with the probability of participating more in these “experiments”. On the other hand, even if young people who have started relatively early to speak, become alcoholics, they face fewer problems in the future “- says Anti Latvala, a researcher at the University of Helsinki (Finland).
Finnish scientists came to this conclusion after comparing the prevalence of alcohol dependence among fraternal twins, residents of Finland, which country, according to WHO, is one of the “most drinking” ones. The experiment consisted in gathering information about their physical and mental development by interviewing the parents.
Among all data Latvala and his colleagues chose only such pairs twins with markedly differing levels of intellectual development in early childhood and adolescence, and then tracked how often they have been exposed to alcoholism. Finnish twins, who faster than their peers learn to speak and read much more often become alcoholics.
The reason for this phenomenon is the following feature of these young people, as evidenced by survey data – they have been more keen in searching new sensations, compared with their siblings, and among their friends there were many who abused alcohol. However, these data should not be interpreted as a “conviction” as it is found these persons often start to drink less in adulthood than their less capable siblings or others.
