Many say that they drink alcohol to forget the penalties, but if they only do it for that reason, maybe they should think twice, since a recent study suggests that the consumption of this type of drink could have the exact opposite effect on people: that is, it would improve our memory. Specifically, information learned before we started drinking.
After this research, published in the Nature Journal Reports , is the University of Exeter (England). Of course, the scientists who have carried it out point out that this supposed and limited positive effect must be taken into consideration together with the numerous negative effects that alcohol intake has on our memory and also on our mental and physical health.
To reach their conclusions, the group of researchers carried out an experiment involving 88 people – 31 men and 57 women, between 18 and 53 years of age. They were subjected to a word learning task in their respective homes and then randomly divided into two different groups: those in the first group were told to drink as much as they wanted (the mean was 82.59 grams throughout the night, that is, about four drinks); to those of the second, that they did not ingest anything.
On the following day, they were asked to carry out the same learning task again, and they detected that those who had drunk alcohol the previous day after exercising, remembered better what they had learned during the exercise.
“Our research not only showed that those who had drunk alcohol improved when repeating the word learning task, but that this effect was stronger among those who drank more,” explained Professor Celia Morgan, from the University of Exeter, in a press release The researchers admit that they do not fully understand the causes of this effect , but they believe that the main explanation would be that “alcohol blocks the learning of new information and, therefore, the brain has more resources available to establish other recently learned information in long-term memory. ”The theory is that the hippocampus, the area of the brain that is really important in memory, would consolidate memories so that they are transferred from short-term to long-term memory term.
Previously, this conclusion had been reached under laboratory conditions, but this is the first study that claims to test it in a natural environment , with people drinking in their own homes.
It is not the first study to suggest that alcohol improves memory. Another, carried out by researchers at John Hopkins University in Baltimore (USA) and published in the journal Translational Psychiatry , explained that, although the day after we get drunk, we may not remember everything that happened, the negative experiences However, they could become even more entrenched in our gray matter than if we had not drunk.
Much healthier options
Given the many harmful effects that alcohol has on our body and on our mind (irreversibly damages our neurons, affects fertility and the immune system, deteriorates such important organs as the liver, stomach, pancreas …), yes you need to improve your memory, we suggest that you think of much safer and beneficial alternatives for your health.
For example, exercising, sleeping well, using mnemonic rules, eating a healthy diet (chocolate, for example, helps), opening and closing your hands – yes, it sounds weird, but clenching your right fist for a minute and a half would help. in the process of memory formation – or play brain training games. For more information, take a look at our article 12 tricks to improve memory .
