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Light drinking may protect brain function:
UGA study shows that for older people it could help cognitive condition
[...] The study examined the link between alcohol consumption and changes in cognitive function over time among middle-aged and older adults in the U.S.
[...] Compared to nondrinkers, they found that those who had a drink or two a day tended to perform better on cognitive tests over time.
Even when other important factors known to impact cognition such as age, smoking or education level were controlled for, they saw a pattern of light drinking associated with high cognitive trajectories.
The optimal amount of drinks per week was between 10 and 14 drinks. But that doesn't mean those who drink less should start indulging more, says Zhang.
"It is hard to say this effect is causal," he said. "So, if some people don't drink alcoholic beverages, this study does not encourage them to drink to prevent cognitive function decline."
Journal Reference:
Ruiyuan Zhang, Luqi Shen, Toni Miles, et al. Association of Low to Moderate Alcohol Drinking With Cognitive Functions in US Adults [open], JAMA Network Open (DOI: 10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2020.7922)
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 03 2020, @04:58AM (2 children)
First let's consider another series of studies, pretty similar to this one, that have recently been 'debunked'. There were a wide array of studies that showed that drinking a small amount was associated with better health outcomes on average. However what a recent study showed is that these studies did not effectively consider *why* people were no longer drinking. And a significant chunk of the reasoning there is related to declining health. And so when you look at those who do not drink, it gets biased by this group who chose to stop drinking because of health reasons. And our goofy social science studies then claim that light to moderate drinking is 'associated with' (which they always imply strongly is causation) better health outcomes.
Social science should not be called science, because in general it's not. If you can't *meaningfully* test things then you're not engaging in science. So for instance if you want to test this hypothesis what you do is simple: you take 1000 people who have never drunk and force them to start drinking, take 1000 people and force them not to drink, and take 1000 people and let them do whatever. Let it cook for about 50 years and then compare and derive conclusions. Of course the problem is obvious: such an experiment is impossible in general. And so the social sciences on sampling of groups who voluntarily engage in the desired action, but that is inherently biasing. And more importantly, there's simply no good way to overcome these biases. Imagine you exclude those who stopped drinking for health related reasons - well you've suddenly just artificially improved the health of non-drinkers because some of them may not be drinking for health reasons but ones that have nothing to do with alcohol itself. E.g. - somebody is taking some sort of medicine that interacts poorly with alcohol.
And in this study there's similar easy to see biases. Strong religious beliefs are correlated with people not drinking. They're also correlated with lower intelligence. So what are you going to do, simply exclude all religious people from your study? Now you have a new bias. And so forth and so on. If we had any sense at all we'd tear down the social sciences because bad misleading information is likely much worse than no information at all. Some people will see this study and go 'omg, time to start downing a couple of 6 packs each week'. When in reality it's likely that the only thing they'll see happen there is the rapid deterioration of their own body.
And yes, I realize this paper adds a cautionary 'it's hard to say if this effect is causal' but few really appreciate that this does translate into proper English more likely, 'We've got no fucking clue if this means anything and it probably doesn't - but we need to get published, so LOL.'
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 03 2020, @05:16AM
Come to think of it further perhaps some people who never drank have never done so exactly because they already have health problems and they are afraid that alcohol could make their health problems even worse. That alone can bias your results.
Thanks for this post. Insightful.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 03 2020, @01:28PM
Definitely and even then, if you follow these things the research goes back and forth over it.
Really, a few drinks now and then is unlikely to cause much damage, but alcohol is poison and you're putting additional stress on the organs that are intended to filter toxins out of your body when you do it. Personally, I've got a mild liver condition and prefer to take it easy on my liver when possible, even though it's not medically necessary. I have no particular way of knowing what might happen in the future and I just don't have a liver that works as efficiently as it should.