The more alcohol you drink the faster your brain shrinks – going from one glass a day to two ages your grey matter by two years, study suggests

A large study of drinkers in the UK shows that drinking two or more units of alcohol a day is associated with shrinking and premature ageing of the brain

Each extra drink makes the shrinking worse. ‘The difference between zero and four alcoholic drinks was more than 10 years of ageing,’ one of the scientists says

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Drinking more than one unit of alcohol - beer, wine or spirits - daily may shrink the brain, a new study suggests. Photo: Getty Images

Published: 6:15pm, 13 Mar 2022

Those of you who gave up alcohol – or tried to – for Dry January may want to consider recommitting to it. The latest research suggests even moderate alcohol consumption – drinking just a few glasses of wine or beer a week – is associated with a reduction in brain matter.

A study of 36,000 adults in the UK has shown that going from drinking one unit of alcohol a day to two a day is associated with the equivalent of ageing by two years.

This is the difference between one half pint (284ml in UK, 296ml in US) of beer a day and a pint of beer, one small glass of wine a day and two, and one measure of spirits a day and two.

People who drink more heavily have even greater changes in brain structure and size, which are associated with cognitive impairments.

The fact that we have such a large sample size allows us to find subtle patterns

Gideon Nave, study co-author

The study led by US researchers at the University of Pennsylvania concluded that having more alcohol was linked to having less brain matter.

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