Sunday, October 07, 2007

Study in rats suggests moderate alcohol consumption improves recall

Moderate alcohol consumption may actually improve memory:
Among the normal rats, the animals that consumed moderate amounts of alcohol fared better on both tests compared with the teetotalers. Rats on a heavy alcohol diet did not do well on object recognition (and, in fact, showed signs of neurotoxicity), but they performed better than their normal brethren on the emotional memory task.
Bad news if you recently experienced something that you don't want to remember too vividly, like trauma:
"People often drink to 'drown sorrows,'" Kalev says. "Our results suggest that this could actually paradoxically promote traumatic memories and lead to further drinking, contributing to the development of alcoholism."
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