Dr. Thomas Vander Ven
Motherboard writer Joel Warner turned to Dr. Thomas Vander Ven, Professor of Sociology, for a first-person story about “the mass-market version of an underground stoner game” in Colorado.
Warner explored the game of Zonk, and its potential impact on the cannabis market in Colorado, asking Vander Ven about his research on alcohol drinking games.
Such pastimes tie into humanity’s longtime interest into turning inebriation into a contest. Drinking games date back at least to wine dregs-tossing game Kottabos in ancient Greece and various dice and riddle competitions in ancient China. But the popularity of such games has apparently grown in the past few decades, especially on college campuses, according to Thomas Vander Ven, a sociology professor at Ohio University who spent nine years observing drinking culture on college campuses, bars, festivals, and house parties in the Midwest. Drinking games promote bonding and teamwork, according to Vander Ven, plus allow players to demonstrate their alcoholic prowess: “If someone drinks a ton of beers and keeps going, or pukes and rallies, it is heroic,” Vander Ven told me. “It promotes status.”
But maybe most importantly, drinking games offer a fast and efficient way for folks to get really drunk. That’s not an unintended consequence of such activities; it’s the point.
“I believe middle class college students lead relatively unproblematic, unchallenging lives,” said Vander Ven. “Drinking leads to all sorts of crises, like getting sick, getting into fights, getting arrested and arguing with partners. Collective intoxication makes all these things happen, and they know it. It requires these students to work together to address these problems. That problem solving promotes group cohesion and results in war stories that last a lifetime.”
The negative consequences of drinking games likely far outweigh such group cohesion and war stories, added Vander Ven. Study after study has associated drinking games with alcohol problems.
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