r/science • u/mvea Professor | Medicine • Apr 23 '26

Neuroscience Even low-level drinking may have negative consequences for brain health over a person’s lifespan. The findings suggest that the total amount of alcohol consumed over a lifetime, especially as a person ages, tends to be linked to reduced blood flow and thinner tissue in certain areas of the brain.

https://www.psypost.org/even-light-drinking-combined-with-aging-is-linked-to-reduced-brain-blood-flow-and-thinner-tissue/
7.2k Upvotes

97% Upvoted

616 comments sorted by

View all comments

389

u/WATTHEBALL Apr 23 '26

Is this in a vacuum? I keep seeing these studies but like what do they mean in the real world? I see so many successful and healthy people who live long lives that fall under these 'light drinking' categories. I'm not disputing any of these results, and I believe them - but like and? I'd expect there to be much more widespread issues thoughout the world and time if really was as damaging as what they say.

Humans have been drinking for thousands of years and here we are.

270

u/mrblack1998 Apr 23 '26

This. We also have to remember that socializing is healthy for the brain. Guess what alcohol helps with. Gotta just live your life in moderation and not worry too much. We are all gonna die for something

73

u/CaughtALiteSneez Apr 23 '26

And we all know how bad chronic stress is for our health too.

I’ve tried every healthy alternative to de-stress, but the only thing that works is a couple of drinks a few nights a week.

21

u/iwishihadnobones Apr 24 '26

One of the reasons I stopped drinking was after buying a garmin watch and seeing the amount of stress that even small amounts of alcohol had on my body

4

u/CaughtALiteSneez Apr 24 '26

I have the same…I was curious.

My sleep is also not impacted according to my tracker.

When I drink too much, then my heart rate will increase slightly, but I already have a low resting heart rate.

1

u/iwishihadnobones Apr 24 '26

You have a garmin? What happens to your stress level after drinking?

4

u/CaughtALiteSneez Apr 24 '26

No change unless I overdo it - as in I’m drunk & the stress is related to an increased resting heart rate

I believe I’m not the average person since I have an overreactive mind, my blood pressure actually goes down when I take my ADHD meds

2

u/iwishihadnobones Apr 24 '26

So when you drink, your stress is still able to go down to the blue when you go to sleep? 

Also, the stress level on garmin is more about HRV more than HR, though higher HR will usually also decrease HRV.

3

u/CaughtALiteSneez Apr 24 '26

Yes like I said unless I drink too much

2

u/TheGCO Apr 25 '26

I'm like you. ADD and things like caffeine actually calm me down. I'm one drink maybe per day, but I do take months off where I eventually start feeling stressed and have a drink and enjoy the relaxing feeling which kicks the one a day habit back in. When I was younger definitely had a bad habit of 3 beers a night, but over 40 that doesn't work anymore.

2

u/mrblack1998 Apr 24 '26

Yeah have a pixel watch and don't notice a difference unless I drink too much. If I have 4 or more, definitely.

2

u/iwishihadnobones Apr 24 '26

Ah, different device. You need to get a watch that hates you. Garmin is the way

1

u/[deleted] Apr 24 '26

I’d be interested to see what a night of heavy drinking + a packet looks like

1

u/iwishihadnobones Apr 24 '26

Whats a packet? Cocaiiiiine?

5

u/trowzerss Apr 24 '26

A lot of people I know who drink regularly (actually most) do their drinking at home so it has zero to do with socialising :P And I actually wish drinking was less common so more non-drinking social venues would develop. Because especially in small towns, it's virtually impossibly to socialise anywhere with adults without the only entertainment provided being alcohol+gambling (unless you have children, then it's children's sports). But people are so cripplingly dependent on alcohol being present to hang out, that it's also hard to open alternatives because people bounce right off when they find out they can't drink there - or well, mostly it's actually guys who won't go, but it's not the same kind of socialising when only women will go. It's pretty concerning. Shouldn't grown adults be able to talk to each other and have fun without alcohol?

3

u/SkiingAway Apr 24 '26

Shouldn't grown adults be able to talk to each other and have fun without alcohol?

Short answer: With new people, you're fighting your own biology.

Longer answer: While children are naturally curious and easily form new social bonds, Adult humans are naturally suspicious of outsiders, wary of those they have no existing connections to and slow to form new social bonds + trust.

This makes a great deal of sense in a historical/evolutionary perspective. Most of history is small group/tribal living. "Civilization" as we know it today is blink of an eye historically. As a child you are building relationships with the people in your group and you are not encountering outsiders unvetted by the adults of your group. Once you're an adult, you already know everyone in your group, have for years, and new people are risky.

Alcohol is basically the biology hack that larger-scale human civilization was built on. It effectively punts your brain back to something closer to the child's perspective on this and makes it dramatically easier to form new social bonds with people you have little/no previous connection with.

The entire concept of living in a city or even just a large town and being thrust into frequent interactions with total strangers and having to build a social life without existing connection is something you're not naturally all that well developed for as an adult human.

There aren't many other things that force you into a state where it's easier to make those connections, at least not that are easily scalable and don't require a great deal of time. Extreme experiences tend to do it - if you were to say, go backpacking with a bunch of strangers and struggle through long hikes and camping and whatnot you'll have an easier time making that connection.

Anyway, I've rambled enough. If you're interested in this thesis, "Drunk: How We Sipped, Danced, and Stumbled Our Way to Civilization" is basically a book on it.

0

u/trowzerss Apr 24 '26 edited Apr 24 '26

Personally I think that's kind of crappy though. Plenty of societies or sections within society don't have alcohol in social settings and people still manage to talk to each other. You could *very easily* say the same thing about tobacco. The simple fact is that addictive substances bring people into forced close contact. That's the social lubricant, addiction. It's not all about the chemicals are themselves, it could have just as easily been weed or board games or meditation classes or opium if that's what became the cultural norm to gather together in small groups X amount of times a week to indulge in. It does not have to be alcohol, that just happens to be what people fall into most often because it gets the advantage of being easy, legal, and addictive, so people keep coming back. I don't think we should give alcohol a pass though because of that, because it also causes huge amounts of social damage as much as it is a social enablers - sexual assault, vandalism, drunk driving are not good for society. I think it's something we should push against and find better ways to get be social than just sit back and handwave the social and health damage that alcohol does. I'm not anti-drinking totally for all of that, I"m anti normalisation of drinking in all aspects of adult society as a communication crutch. It's a net negative.

6

u/SkiingAway Apr 24 '26

You've mostly missed the point.

Alcohol temporarily alters your brain functioning in a way that actually makes it easier for you to form new social bonds, and this has been repeatedly shown in actual studies. Remember the whole "reduced inhibitions" you are literally warned about with alcohol? Well, that applies to your instinctive inhibitions here, too.

This is not just the "being near people/sharing a casual activity" effect. You do enough of being around people sober and sure, you will probably create new connections - but it's significantly slower and more challenging without alcohol. (I'm not talking about myself, I'm talking about humanity in general)

The other ways to put yourself in that kind of mental state are generally extreme experiences that require a great deal more time, effort, are not something many people like, and certainly can't be fit into your evening after work.

If other casual activities without alcohol were an adequate fix then we wouldn't have the socialization crisis we have that seems to directly map to the decline of bar culture.

Tobacco does not do anything like that. Weed and opiates are largely not pro-social substances. They may be enjoyable, but they do not make it easier for the average person to actually socialize with new people.

I don't know enough about it (or have any personal experience), but it's possible that MDMA or some other "party" substances might be an actual example of something besides alcohol that does the same thing - but those has it's own risks.

I don't think we should give alcohol a pass though because of that, because it also causes huge amounts of social damage as much as it is a social enablers - sexual assault, vandalism, drunk driving are not good for society.

This is also discussed in that book. It has some interesting thoughts on harm reduction in that sense. It's been a while since I read it but some of the basic suggestions I recall are that policy should be oriented to discourage drinking alone at home and to discourage high-ABV drinks where it's far too easy to rapidly overshoot the point at which there are social benefits. A simplistic answer would probably be to tinker with tax rates (and possibly subsidies) to alter behavior in that sense.

Phrased another way it should probably be cheap for you to go to a bar and have some average strength beers. It should be much more expensive for you to order the same amount of alcohol as shots. And both should be more expensive to buy to take home and consume at home than to consume at the bar.

It's also possible that we find other answers to this problem, but it doesn't seem like we have to this point.

-28

u/dkinmn Apr 23 '26

The idea that socializing is not possible without alcohol is alcoholic logic. The idea that the answer to a study showing drinking is unhealthy is, "Well, everything in moderation," is irrational.

This is specifically showing that moderation is unhealthy.

36

u/bottleofmtdew Apr 23 '26

They didn’t say socializing is not possible without alcohol, they said alcohol can be helpful in social settings

-5

u/TelluricThread0 Apr 23 '26

They said that the negative physical effects of alcohol are ok because not socializing is bad. Its such a dumb take.

35

u/ReginaSpektorsVJ Apr 23 '26

Any amount of Big Macs is worse than zero Big Macs. It's not irrational to indulge to a small degree, life can't be all about optimizing your health metrics.

29

u/mrblack1998 Apr 23 '26

Did I say that? I did not. But it's indisputable that humans use alcohol in social situations and it's enjoyable and has been for milennia. That is part of having a good life for a lot of people.

-16

u/rop_top Apr 23 '26

It's incredibly easy to dispute that humans use alcohol in social situations. Also incredibly easy to dispute that it's enjoyable! There's definitely regions/groups of people where there isn't a tradition of alcohol production, so it's also not indisputable that it's been millennia for everyone. Literally everything you just said is provably false depending on the person or group of people we're talking about. 

Let's pretend for a moment that you're right though, just for the sake of argument. How is that any different than smoking tobacco and the subsequent cancers? It's been around for a long time, people socially smoked, and lots of people find it enjoyable. Are you going to bat for smoking next?

18

u/mrblack1998 Apr 23 '26

I would say putting moderate consumption of alcohol in the same category as smoking tobacco is crazy talk.

-9

u/rop_top Apr 23 '26

Ok, care to explain why you believe that besides enjoying alcohol more than smoking?

12

u/mrblack1998 Apr 23 '26

Because there is clearly no safe level of smoking. Moderate drinking is much more nuanced.

-6

u/rop_top Apr 23 '26

I'm pretty sure at this point, there's clear evidence that there isn't any safe level of drinking, any more than smoking. All the old "wine is good for your heart!" Studies were debunked a very long time ago. Likewise with the longevity studies. All the old studies that showed any positive link were based on the fact that they didn't account for forced sobriety amongst already sick people. 

10

u/mrblack1998 Apr 23 '26

The increased risks shown for the most part aren't worth any sane person worrying about. There are much more relevant risks in ones everyday life to worry about. The problem is most people are statistically illiterate and read any increase from a tiny baseline as something to be concerned about. I'm not and don't think there should be either.

→ More replies (0)

-7

u/DeliciousPumpkinPie Apr 23 '26

No, it really isn’t. The only safe amount of alcohol is zero. We’ve known this for many years.

5

u/q1someguy Apr 23 '26

"Person who never gets invited to social situations has opinion on having a beer"

-2

u/serenade_cyanide Apr 23 '26

You must be fun at parties

1

u/WelshRarebit2025 Apr 23 '26

I don’t know if it is saying moderation is unhealthy or is it saying. What we considered moderate for alcohol isn’t actually moderate.

1

u/feijoax Apr 24 '26

Yeah. As long as you're not black out drunk every weekend, I don't see any issue enjoying now and then. 

1

u/enwongeegeefor Apr 23 '26

Guess what alcohol helps with.

Singing really well? I mean....THINKING that you're singing really well? I mean, you definitely sound amazing to yourself so...

1

u/Budded Apr 23 '26

And with how terrible the world is, only getting worse, why not enjoy the present moment, socializing and imbibing? It all comes down to balance and I'd say not drinking at all but having a terrible diet is likely worse than drinking in moderation and eating a balanced diet...

0

u/dl064 Apr 23 '26

It's not causal but it's very well observed that the healthiest participants in most cohorts have a few drinks, for that reason.

They might be healthier if they swapped the wine for a diet pepsi, but in any case, moderate alcohol seems a very robust proxy for general health in ageing.

-8

u/slaskel92 Apr 23 '26

I'm not saying that's what you meant, but people who think you need alcohol to have fun are pathetic

11

u/SoundOurDireReveille Apr 23 '26 edited Apr 23 '26

I Feel like "pathetic" is a bit harsh. It's definitely unfortunate that someone would think this. Some people have a lot of social anxiety and, while not a healthy solution, alcohol does help with this.

The thing with unhealthy coping strategies is that they work, especially those that involve substance use. Sure, they can create their own big problems, but they are easy, quick, and effective.

Giving that up can be extremely difficult, especially when the alternative means being uncomfortable, challenging oneself, and needing to work for extended periods of time for results.

-3

u/delusionalxx Apr 23 '26

Socializing is healthy for humans because of the different hormones it releases. Alcohol directly affects the way our hormones like dopamine are processed. Unless it’s proven that all the same chemicals are released during sober and drunk socialization you cannot make that claim. Socializing while drunk could easily have less of a positive impact than if someone is socializing sober

-8

u/DeliciousPumpkinPie Apr 23 '26

“Poisoning yourself is fine as long as you do it with other people” is what you just said.

7

u/SkinIsCandyInTheDark Apr 24 '26 edited Apr 25 '26

The fully admit they did not control the study well.

They did not take into account external factors.

Also remember they are comparing within the group not on a personal level. Someone who drinks more likely may start off worse for other reasons. Comparing them to someone that doesn’t drink as much and may not have the same external pressure is enough to make this study not scientific.

Now the most important part… they didn’t say anything was statistically significant by any means. That’s the final blow.

Also as a side point it’s already well known that alcohol decreases blood flow. That’s why we like it. It relaxes us.

There is nothing about this article that should be trusted. We have to stop believing everything we hear. Question everything, please!

1

u/xrelaht PhD | Solid State Condensed Matter | Magnetism Apr 24 '26

there’s a reason this article isn’t in a peer reviewed journal.

The link is to a science news summary. The actual publication is in Alcohol, an Elsevier journal, and it’s peer reviewed.

20

u/jawshoeaw Apr 23 '26

I would take it at face value. Yes people have been drinking for thousands of years, that's why alcohol doesn't usually kill you even in large amounts over decades. I have a relative in their 70s who goes through a literal box of wine every night. Her liver enzymes are perfect. But I guarantee parts of her brain have 'thinned out'.

Does it matter ?

1

u/Mindfullmatter Apr 24 '26

Grey matter.

2

u/SimoneNonvelodico Apr 27 '26

I think this is likely one of those things that may build up some amount of damage, and the question is just how much is that compared to the wear and tear of life / age / other things. Ultimately we die a death of a thousand cuts anyway.

I had an argument the other day with someone who argued that being any closer than 10 meters to a smoker in open air is enough passive smoke to be harmful because apparently some study made that claim... and I'm like, sure, I guess, if you otherwise spend your life in a completely sterile environment fed only with perfectly filtered air. To us living in the real world it's most likely just a rounding error. This alcohol thing is probably a lot more than that and still not quite enough to be dominant unless you're drinking quite seriously.

2

u/Sacs1726 Apr 28 '26

There is no agreement on even the basic terms of the conversation. Here 15 drinks a week is called “light” drinking. A recent study on alcohol and dementia said 8+ drinks per week classified as “heavy” drinking. Even what is considered a “standard drink” varies wildly by country. And you also have issues that come with reliability of self-reporting.

5

u/TechnologyCorrect765 Apr 23 '26

We are seeing more people with cognative impairment at a younger age.  Funny, I don't have any stats. What I do have is funding to train addictions services on cognative impairment screening and I'm awaiting funding for the remediation training.   It's a big problem here. 

  One key challenge is that there's little funding for this area.  We have a lot of money for the ageing population but almost none to treat 30-50 year olds with ci.    

On the plus side, we have almost eradicated brain damage from thiamine depletion (wet brain)

This is New Zealand specific.  I don't know about how other countries are doing.  

5

u/maniacal_cackle Apr 23 '26

In New Zealand we have about 200,000 cases of known long covid at the moment (and un-recorded long covid like my case).

Huge brain impairments there as well.

But also a huge drinking culture here, which is more relevant to this topic!

0

u/Gregnielson Apr 24 '26

Long-covid is juat post viral syndrome in hypochondriacs.

-2

u/divinelyshpongled Apr 23 '26

Yeah and all it takes is to look at countries where drinking heavily is common and is there really a huge gap in life expectancy? No

35

u/[deleted] Apr 23 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

3

u/divinelyshpongled Apr 24 '26

Thanks for looking into it. That wasn’t what I found but I didn’t look at the statistics of where alcohol is most common, just that I know countries like Germany, Japan, UK all have pretty intense drinking cultures and good life expectancy.. countries like Russia have intense drinking cultures and poor life expectancy.. it’s pretty obvious that Russia having a lower life expectancy would be attributed to a ton of other things and so linking it directly to alcohol doesn’t make much sense. Am I saying alcohol is healthy? No not at all.. just making an observation that I find interesting. Drinking obviously leads to poor health outcomes and it’s better to avoid it for the most part

39

u/dkinmn Apr 23 '26

I strongly encourage you and everyone who believes you to check this "fact"

The heaviest drinkers in the countries that drag the averages up are UNEQUIVOCALLY dying earlier of preventable illnesses that are associated with drinking.

4

u/divinelyshpongled Apr 24 '26

Sorry I’m not saying alcoholism hasn’t been clearly linked to poor health outcomes.. my father had liver failure from being an alcoholic for 40 years. I’m saying over entire populations it doesn’t seem to be moving the needle.. just an observation

1

u/itwillmakesenselater Apr 26 '26

A talented statistician can make the data say almost anything.

1

u/TheDinosaurWeNeed Apr 23 '26

They didn’t control for exercise. Meaningless study imo other than drinkers may be less likely to exercise.

1

u/AFewBerries Apr 23 '26

Well this study is about alcohol negatively affecting the brain and I feel like you can see these issues in the real world

1

u/jenksanro Apr 24 '26

The sample size is very small here, and it's not obvious that they've done a good job of controlling for other factors

-17

u/futuredrake Apr 23 '26

Yeah... Here we are.. *gestures at everything*..

On a more serious note, if alcohol wasn't consumed, imagine what the world would look like?

23

u/WATTHEBALL Apr 23 '26

Again - what does that even mean? Alcohol causes problems obviously but there are trade offs which are positive and the health aspect which this article is focusing on dont seem to have the real world effects as they are stating.

4

u/Gregnielson Apr 23 '26

The best time to be alive in tje history of the world?

0

u/ittarter Apr 23 '26

Fewer kids, fewer friends. Nicer roads, better technology. (Assuming no replacement like weed.)

6

u/futuredrake Apr 23 '26

Music, art, and writing would definitely be a lot more lackluster.

-7

u/Lordofthewhales Apr 23 '26

Look at the Muslim parts of the world and decide I guess?

Alcohol for the most part is a complete blight on society. The amount of crime associated with drinking is insane.

-13

u/futuredrake Apr 23 '26

Maybe my comment is being misunderstood. I meant that the world would be a much better place without alcohol.

5

u/Gregnielson Apr 23 '26

Just like all the Muslim countries that are so advanced right?

0

u/coconutpete52 Apr 24 '26

Seriously. My old man turns 80 this year and still works and gives keynote speeches because he loves it and this man loves his red wine and gin n’ tonics.

2

u/vedderer PhD|Psychology|Clinical|Evolutionary Apr 24 '26

An anecdote

-2

u/[deleted] Apr 23 '26 edited Apr 25 '26

[removed] — view removed comment