Iceland has largely kicked teen drinking. What can it teach other countries?
| Reykjavik, Iceland
In the late 1980s, when Bj枚rgvin 脥var Gu冒brandsson was a teenager, alcohol and school dances went hand-in-hand. While he was later to drinking than his peers 鈥� more interested in playing soccer and guitar 鈥� when he did start around age 16, he would smuggle alcohol in his guitar case into school events.
鈥淚 think the adults just turned a blind eye,鈥� says Mr. Gu冒brandsson. 鈥淭he culture was, I think, 鈥榯hey鈥檙e just kids. As long as they aren鈥檛 fighting, it鈥檚 okay.鈥欌��
Today, as a teacher at Langholt school in Reykjavik where he once studied, he says that if a student were to show up drunk to a dance, it would聽 be such a scandal that the school principal would likely call child protective services.
In reality, that rarely happens because聽substance abuse on a wide scale has essentially become a 鈥渘on-issue,鈥� says聽Gu冒brandsson.聽Alcohol and school dances, in other words, don鈥檛 go together in Iceland today.聽
This school is hardly alone. Teen drinking 鈥� as well as teen smoking, marijuana use, and abuse of other drugs 鈥� has plummeted across Iceland in the past two decades as academics, policy makers, and parents joined forces to clamp down. And now cities around the world are looking to this tiny island nation for clues on how to tackle underage drinking.
Yet beyond adolescent alcohol and drug use, Iceland has shifted thinking on youth culture itself, making it by many accounts more innocent and carefree. It has expanded parents鈥� notions of childhood and the importance of family time, while reinforcing the maxim that it 鈥渢akes a village鈥� to raise a child, says hrefna Sigurj贸nsd贸ttir, director of the national umbrella for parental organizations in schools, Home and School, one of the key players in the聽federal-state government program now known as Youth in Iceland.
She calls it an 鈥渁wakening鈥� that has taken place at home, school, and beyond. 鈥淚 think people are not confused anymore about, 鈥榠s this kid an adult or not?鈥欌��
A different approach
Those lines were once blurrier. After Mr. Gu冒brandsson graduated from school, teens were drinking even harder. In the 1990s, teen revellers packed downtown Reykjavik at 3 a.m. on weekends. Icelandic youths in fact were some of the hardest drinking kids in Europe at that time. In 1998, 42 percent of tenth graders surveyed in Iceland said they had been drunk within the last 30 days.
Prevention projects were established, similar to the American program Drug Abuse Resistance Education (D.A.R.E.), built on the ethos of empowering teens to 鈥渏ust say no.鈥澛�
Yet substance use kept going up,聽says Inga Dora Sigf煤sd贸ttir, cofounder of the Icelandic Center for Social Research and Analysis (ICSRA), which is the data hub for Youth in Iceland. 鈥淎 group of people came together, sat down and said, 鈥榳e need to find a different approach. This is obviously not working.鈥�
One of the problems was an ambiguous view of the line between child and adulthood, she says.聽
One of the most absolute rules to take effect was legal curfews: Kids ages 12 and younger must be home at 8 p.m. in the winter and 10 p.m. in the summer. Thirteen to 16-year-olds must be home at 10 p.m. in the winter and by midnight in the summer, even when the sun is still blazing. Icelandic parents in some communities carry out night patrols, with reflector vests and flashlights, to make sure kids are safely at home when they should be.聽Thousands of fridge magnets were sent to households, and still are, to remind children of the rules.聽聽
Parents began to sign agreements, through schools and parental organizations, with various pledges such as not allowing unsupervised parties in their homes or spending at least an hour a day with their children. 鈥淭wenty years back people were surprised,鈥� Ms. Sigf煤sd贸ttir says. 鈥淲e had to change things here. We wanted to believe in this idea of 鈥榪uality time,' and not having to spend too much time with them. We had to change a very liberal view towards adolescent drinking. People didn鈥檛 think it was important.鈥�
'It鈥檚 the law. It鈥檚 on the refrigerator.'
Through the program, the municipalities funded and expanded after-school activities, from sports to gymnastics, to music, art, and ballet. The basic idea is to keep kids busy 鈥� and out of trouble 鈥� and help them find meaning in their lives that dissuades them from seeking alcohol or drugs in the first place.
The entire program is backed with data from yearly surveys that ask kids if they drink or how much time they spend with their parents, and requires constant dialogue between academics, policy makers, and people on the ground. For example, the data showed that getting a critical mass of parents to buy into the program was more important than getting every parent to do so.
At its heart, it takes the onus off the teens themselves 鈥� the opposite of the D.A.R.E. approach 鈥� and places it on the community.
鈥淚t does not concern teaching individual children about responsible choices, or even about making them responsible for their own behavior,鈥� says 脕lfgeir Kristj谩nsson, a former data analyst at ICSRA who is now an assistant professor of public health at West Virginia University. 鈥淭he Icelandic approach 鈥� is to strengthen the societal and protective factors and drive down risk factors.鈥�
The program has transformed family life in Iceland. Ms. Sigurj贸nsd贸ttir, from Home and School, says that when she was 16 she moved from her rural community to Reykjavik. It is a common practice, since so many towns in Iceland don鈥檛 have upper secondary schools. She moved into an apartment with a friend her age. 鈥淲e thought we were so adult but we weren鈥檛 really,鈥� she says. 鈥淲e had a lot of fun, but in hindsight it was hard as well. Sometimes you just need your mommy.鈥�
Asked if she could imagine the same one day for her two young children, she responds immediately, 鈥渘o way.鈥�
Families report being a closer unit today. Seventy five percent of parents knew where their children were most of the time in 2014, compared to 52 percent in 2000, according to ICSRA data. Fifty percent of tenth graders said they were often or almost always with their parents on weeknights in 2014, more than twice the 23 percent in 2000.
Ultimately parents in Iceland say it鈥檚 made it easier to be a parent. They don鈥檛 have to battle with their kids over when and how often they are allowed out, says Baldvin Berndsen, a father of three. 鈥淚 use it all the time. I say, 鈥榠t鈥檚 not me. It鈥檚 the law. It鈥檚 on the refrigerator.鈥�
Staying sober for sports
On a bone-chilling December afternoon, the sun has already set as girls and boys strap up after school for practice at the Throttur soccer club, which sits in the shadow of Iceland鈥檚 national stadium.
The municipality subsidizes children with a $500 coupon per year 鈥� about half the cost annually 鈥� to enroll in extracurriculars.聽Reykjavik鈥檚 Mayor Dagur Eggertsson says 80 percent of kids from age 6 to 18 take advantage of the program.
The number of registered players, from ages 5 to 18, has doubled in the past ten years to 1,000 at this club alone, says Gudberg Jonsson, another pioneer of Youth in Iceland and a research scientist at the Human Behavior Laboratory at the University of Iceland. That follows national trends.
Far from generating concerns that Icelandic youth are over-programmed, after-school leisure is considered among Youth in Iceland鈥檚 biggest successes. Their statistical analysis shows a clear correlation over time between engagement in activities and teenage sobriety.
In the suburb of Rima outside Reykjavik, Birta Zimsen, a 16-year-old in a maroon hoodie who won 鈥淢iss Tenth Grade鈥� last year at the local school is taking a breather from basketball practice on a December evening. When asked if she drinks, she says no. 鈥淚 play basketball," she says.聽
Sitting next to her is Thorgeir Tryggvason, who is 21 and at around 16 promised his grandparents he would not drink until he was 20, the legal age. He found it a promise easy to keep. 鈥淚t is not 鈥榗ool鈥� to drink in school like it was 20 years ago,鈥� Mr. Tryggvason, an avid soccer player, says. 鈥淵ou were a 鈥榗ool guy鈥� if you did sports.鈥�
It doesn鈥檛 mean that teen drinking is completely eradicated. And Mr. Berndsen, who is president of the parents鈥� association at the school in Rima where his 14-year-old studies, says more could be done. He wants subsidies for sports for any student in the mandatory system to cover the cost entirely. He also wants parents in his community to resume night patrols that have ceased in recent years. He worries that the media is not accurately portraying the dangers of marijuana, and harder drug threats still exist. 鈥淭he availability [of drugs] is out there, and I know kids here have said 鈥業 know someone that knows somebody who could get me whatever I need,鈥欌�� he says.
Going global?
How replicable Iceland's model really is remains an unanswered question. Since 2006, Youth in Iceland has introduced their methods in 35 municipalities across Europe, an initiative called Youth in Europe.
And their phones keep ringing. A 2015 study, the European School Survey Project on Alcohol and Other Drugs, measured the percentage of 15- and 16-year-old students who said they drank alcohol in the 30 days prior to the survey. It was 48 percent on average across Europe, compared to 9 percent in Iceland.
And Mr. Kristj谩nsson is currently introducing a version of Youth in Iceland in two counties in West Virginia. According to a Monitoring the Future study released in December, the rate of American 10th graders who said they鈥檇 been drunk in the last 30 days was 9 percent in 2017 鈥� a decline over the long term, but still almost twice Iceland's rate today.
One of the biggest challenges聽Kristj谩nsson faces is cultural. 鈥淎merica is a country of individualism, we believe in individual choice and individual responsibility,鈥� he says.
Sigf煤sd贸ttir, who recently returned from Chile to introduce the program, says skeptics ask whether the model suits Iceland because it鈥檚 a small island nation. She counters with a slide she prepared showing Malta (also an island) and Lichtenstein (also tiny) where youth drinking rates far surpass those in her country 鈥� being small or surrounded by water doesn't make fighting alcohol abuse any easier.
She argues it is neither geography nor population that matters most when it comes to transferring Iceland's methods. It鈥檚 the fact that children and parents all over the world are essentially the same.
鈥淭hat鈥檚 the beauty of it. It鈥檚 easy to get parents on board, because parents tend to love their kids," she says. 鈥淎nd if you give kids a choice of fun activities and substance use, they always take the fun activities. ... They want healthy lives.鈥�
