Music video scene

(CNN) -- Young people who watch a lot of television -- especially music videos -- are more likely to become teen-age drinkers, according to a Stanford University study.

Stanford researcher Dr. Thomas Robinson, who led the study, says the results are not surprising, since alcohol is the most common beverage shown on television.

The study found that playing computer and video games had no effect in drinking habits, but watching movies in a VCR actually led to an 11 percent decrease in risk.

But researchers also discovered that an increase of one hour each day in watching music videos leads to a 31 percent increase in the risk of drinking over the next 18 months. An hour increase in other types of television corresponded with a 9 percent increase in drinking risk.

"What we're pointing the finger at," said Robinson, "is media representations of alcohol use and advertising."

The study noted that "alcohol use is portrayed more frequently by more attractive, successful, and influential people in a positive social context, often associated with sexually suggestive content, recreation, or motor vehicle use."

'It's really cool'

Researchers also pointed out that alcohol use is rarely portrayed in an unattractive way or shown to have negative consequences.

One 11-year-old girl told CNN's Don Knapp she was not surprised by the results of the study. She said she watches a lot of music videos and looks forward to drinking.

"It's like it's really cool," she said, "and I want to do it, too, so I can be cool."

The study, published in this month's journal Pediatrics, tracked 2,609 ninth-graders in San Jose, California, and followed 1,533 of them through 18 months.

They reported their activities -- how many hours they played video games, for example -- and were asked how many drinks of alcohol they had ever had and how many they had in the previous month. Over the next 18 months, 36.2 percent of 898 nondrinkers began to drink.

Television habits had no effect on the 635 students who already drank, the authors said.

But of the students who did not drink at the start of the study, what they watched on television played a major role in what they did over the next 18 months, the study found.

Robinson said there needs to be "balance in the way alcohol is portrayed so that people who did drink did suffer some consequences from it."

Correspondent Don Knapp and the The Associated Press contributed to this report.