Junior Jake Knight pops a Family Guy DVD into the player. He, his roommates and friends gather around the television, drinks in hand.
Let the games begin.
Stewie, the mischievous baby of the show, makes a sexual reference, and everyone takes a swig. By the third episode on the DVD, laughing and talking drown out the show.
Family Guy is one of the most watched shows on television, and according to Toby Ogle, author of "The Complete Guide to Television and Movie Drinking," the show is one of the many that serve as the basis for drinking games because of its popularity among college-age students, he said.
Although researchers say drinking games can lead people to binge drinking, the games do have benefits. The social atmosphere that accompanies them breaks barriers between cultures, social classes and behavioral differences, according to a Social Issues Research Centre study on the social and cultural aspects of drinking.
Drinking games also play a large role in college culture, as Sarah Cunningham, a graduate student in the Department of Anthropology, pointed out in her thesis presentation Wednesday afternoon at the opening of the department's museum.
Cunningham's thesis, "Ethnographic Exploration in the College Drinking Culture," is an analysis of the role of drinking games in student lives and culture. According to Cunningham's research, drinking games reflect the phases of college that students go through.
"The games involving a lot of people, those reflect important meanings about the early phases of college," Cunningham said. "Freshmen are emphasizing meeting new people. They are more likely to embrace those drinking games that emphasize playing with a larger group of people."
Games such as Never Have I Ever are part of this group, Cunningham said. However, drinking games based on movies and television shows are for upperclassmen, who are building stronger bonds with a smaller group of people, she said.
From card games to board games, people have tried to find ways to make drinking a more active bonding experience. Rules that coincide with television shows and movies create yet another genre in the world of drunken bonding experiences.
Alcohol is a marker for Americans as a transition from work to play. The same idea of relaxation associated with alcohol is associated with television shows, and college students have mastered the art of combining the two activities.
"It's something to do when you're drinking instead of just talking," Knight said. "People are looking for new ways to have fun."
Knight and his roommate Chris Hagerty agreed they play drinking games to socialize with friends.
"Most people just drink and chit-chat, and you get bored doing that," Hagerty said. "[Drinking games] are a really good way to break the ice with someone that's different from you. It's a better atmosphere."
The four men in the house invite people over every week to play beer pong, flippy cup and other drinking games, but they said they play games to movies and television shows the most.
"It's a good way to meet people," Hagerty said. "It's also a good way to socialize, network."
Drinking alcohol liberates people from restrictions faced during their day-to-day lives, according to the SIRC research. Social rules for places such as schools and jobs are left outside of the drinking place, the study said. In the drinking place, new rules are established, not by external sources such as lawmakers, but by the social environment in the room.
Cunningham said her study corroborated the SIRC research.
The environment in which people drink tells everybody how to behave and what the rules are, she said. "College students have their own definitions of what is normal or problematic drinking."
When the drinking hinders other parts of life is when most students believe the drinking is problematic, she said.
Hagerty said people who played drinking games needed to be responsible enough to know when they should stop.
"It's not something that you need to live by," he said. "It's a good way to have fun. It's a good way to enjoy a good time with your friends but not something that you have to do."
John Stauchula, a psychologist at the Counseling Center, said most college students tended to overindulge in alcohol when they played drinking games.
"You don't play a drinking game just to drink one or two drinks moderately," he said. "It's probably one of those times, you know, we warn people to be careful."
Drinking six or seven alcoholic beverages alone would be hard for most people to justify, but when playing a game with friends, the focus of binge drinking becomes a social ritual more than a health concern, Stauchula said.
If the university wants to decrease the amount of drinking around the campus, it should change its policies to fit the social culture rather than the individual, Cunningham suggested.
Cunningham's work, along with 14 other students, will be on display from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday in the museum in Burkhardt Building, room 300 until Spring Semester 2007.
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