Scientists at Oxford University found that any amount of Any amount of alcohol will have a negative impact on the brain . The authors of the new work concluded that the more a person drinks, the smaller his brain becomes.
Many of us believe that a small amount of wine won't hurt anyone. Scientists have proven that this is not the case.
"There is no threshold for drinking. Any alcohol is bad. We also assume that alcohol will damage the entire brain, not as previously thought it will damage its various parts," said lead author Anya Topiwala, senior clinical lecturer at Oxford University.
As part of the work, the data used by scientists are from the UK Biobank. The researchers analyzed measurements from 25,378 participants, such as age, gender, education level, alcohol consumption, brain size of MRI data, hospital visits and outpatient visits, and looked at the results of the memory test.
Higher alcohol consumption is associated with lower gray matter density. The researchers found that even taking into account the biological and behavioral characteristics of individuals, alcohol accounts for 0.8% of the volume changes in gray matter. This seems to be a small number, but it is higher than the impact of other risk factors. For example, this is four times the contribution of smoking or BMI (body mass index).
There is also a negative correlation between alcohol consumption and white matter integrity. In addition, the researchers found that hypertension and high BMI strengthened the negative link between alcohol and brain health.
This study also refuted previous results, which showed that moderate amounts of wine (compared to beer or strong drinks) have a positive effect on brain function. The authors of the work say that any alcohol and any amount of alcohol can have adverse effects on the brain.
