Should The Drinking Age Be Lowered?
Psychology homework help
Response to the two statements separately with a minimum of 100 words each. Respond to each statement with whether you agree/disagree and include one quote and reference citation from an attached reading.
Statement 1:
The drinking age for Americans has been a hot topic for some time now. Currently, the legal age to purchase an alcoholic beverage is 21. Although to many this age seems feasible, I disagree. I think it should be revised to older. In my honest opinion 18 is way too young. The brain doesn’t not fully develop until age 25. If lowered, young adults can not make conscious decision while influenced. Majority of 18 years olds will just be exiting high school with little to no survival skills on how to accurately judge the limits of alcohol. I can see where lowering it would allow the step into adulthood. We would see less underage drinking I just don’t think it’s the best idea at this present moment.
Statement 2:
Based off of the utilitarian approach, the drinking age in the U.S. should not be lowered to 18. An utilitarian has a goal to make life better and do so by increasing pleasure and happiness and decreasing pain and unhappiness. In the reading, Act and Rule utilitarianism, the author explains how the method of utilitarian works. They give the example of buying an ice cream for a party. The article explains how, “As a utilitarian, you should choose the flavor that will result in the most pleasure for the group as a whole. If seven like chocolate and three like vanilla and if all of them get the same amount of pleasure from the flavor they like, then you should choose chocolate.” With that said, majority of people in the U.S. do not think the drinking age should be lowered. Personally, I believe the drinking age should be lowered but the utilitarian approach requires you to count everyone’s opinions are the same, including your own. Not only do most people agree that the drinking age in the U.S. should not be lowered, but lowering the drinking age is proven to potentially cause extremely negative effects. For example, more drunk driving incidents or harmful effects to young adults health. This causes pain and unhappiness and the point of the utilitarian approach is to do the opposite of this. Despite my own opinion and looking at lowering the drinking age as a whole, it should be lowered due to popular opinion and the overwhelming amount of pain and unhappiness it has the potential to have.
Sources:
http://www.iep.utm.edu/util-a-r/
http://www.phil.cmu.edu/Cavalier/80130/part2/sect9.html
Note: Responses should be based on attached reading. Statement one response should have a minimum of 100 words and statement two should have 100 word response as well. Both responses should be separate.
