The 1am queue outside Fabric, a famous London nightclub, stretches 150 metres around the corner despite the drizzle. It is freshers’ week, and the students sway and cling to one another behind the barriers. Others mill near the entrance, kicked out for being too drunk, or crowd into a 24-hour sandwich shop, seeking bread to sober up.

It doesn’t look very different from when I started university just over a decade ago. But when I start speaking to the students, their lives seem quite different. They tell me they go out once a week, much less than my peers. When I repeat this later in the night, I’m assured by others that once a week is on the higher, more debauched end; often, they say, “it’s more a case of once a month”.

New Statesman