Alcoholism News

May 21, 2025

Top Headlines

Thinking Peers Drink More Drives Risky Behavior

May 20, 2025 — The study explores how social influences, particularly peer pressure, impact substance use -- and misuse -- among young adults. A confidential online survey on alcohol use was given to 524 students at a large public university (not ...

Social Drinking Also a Well-Worn Path to Alcohol Use Disorder

May 6, 2025 — When picturing a 'typical' alcoholic, people tend to imagine a person drinking at home alone. But that focus overlooks the social origins of many serious alcohol ...

Seasonal Changes Affect Alcohol Tolerance and Your Waistline

Apr. 30, 2025 — Researchers have found that drug effectiveness, alcohol tolerance, and carbohydrate metabolism change with the seasons. Their findings are based on a comprehensive seasonal gene expression map, which investigated over 54,000 genes in 80 tissues in ...

A Repurposed Anti-Inflammatory Drug May Help Treat Alcohol Use Disorder and Related Pain

Apr. 22, 2025 — A preclinical study finds that a drug already FDA-approved for treating inflammatory conditions may help reduce both alcohol intake and pain sensitivity -- two issues that commonly co-occur with ...

Latest Headlines

updated 10:46pm EDT

Simultaneous Alcohol, Cannabis Use May Fuel More Drinking

Apr. 10, 2025 — A recent study found that people may perceive fewer negative effects of alcohol if they are also using cannabis at the same ...

New Study Finds Surprising Way to Curb College-Aged Drinking Harms -- Without Cutting Alcohol

Apr. 14, 2025 — Researchers have developed and tested an intervention called Counter-Attitudinal Advocacy and compared it to to the well-established Personalized ...

Stress, Depression Factor Into Link Between Insomnia, Heavy Drinking

Apr. 14, 2025 — A new study suggests that perceived stress and depression factor into the relationship between insomnia and hazardous drinking -- perhaps not a surprise. But because the relationship between insomnia ...

Eight or More Drinks Per Week Linked to Signs of Injury in the Brain

Apr. 9, 2025 — Heavy drinkers who have eight or more alcoholic drinks per week have an increased risk of brain lesions called hyaline arteriolosclerosis, signs of brain injury that are associated with memory and ...

Study Reveals How Alcohol Abuse Damages Cognition

Apr. 2, 2025 — For the first time researchers demonstrate in an animal how heavy alcohol use leads to long-term behavioral issues by damaging brain circuits critical for ...

Why Are Night Owls at Greater Risk of Depression?

Mar. 19, 2025 — Mindfulness, total sleep quality, and alcohol consumption may help explain why people who stay up late have a greater risk of depression, according to a new ...

Brain Waves Measure the Effect of Anti-Alcohol Campaigns

Feb. 7, 2025 — To evaluate the effectiveness of public video campaigns against risky alcohol consumption, psychologists used EEG measurements to examine the synchronization of brain activity in groups of viewers. ...

Research in Fruit Flies Pinpoints Brain Pathways Involved in Alcohol-Induced Insomnia

Feb. 6, 2025 — Research in fruit flies has identified specific groups of cholinergic brain cells that are involved in alcohol-induced insomnia. This work could ...

Scientists Discover How Genetic Risk for Alcoholism Changes Brain Cell Behavior

Feb. 3, 2025 — A new study may help explain why some people are more susceptible to developing drinking ...

Preclinical Study Finds Surges in Estrogen Promote Binge Drinking in Females

Dec. 30, 2024 — The hormone estrogen regulates binge drinking in females, causing them to 'pregame' -- consume large quantities of alcohol in the first 30 minutes ...

New Evidence on the Relationship Between Moderate Wine Consumption and Cardiovascular Health

Dec. 18, 2024 — Light and moderate consumption of wine is associated with a lower risk of cardiovascular complications, according to a multicenter study. The study is based on the analysis of a biomarker of wine ...

Rats on Cocaine: When Aversion Is Not Enough

Dec. 3, 2024 — Propensity to addiction starts with the very first drug use experience, a new study ...

'I Don't Feel Your Pain': How Alcohol Increases Aggression

Dec. 2, 2024 — Alcohol's ability to increase people's pain threshold is one reason that drinking also leads to more aggressive behavior, a new study suggests. Researchers found that the less pain that ...

How Long Ring Fingers Can Point to a Love of Alcohol

Nov. 26, 2024 — There is evidence that alcohol consumption is influenced by prenatal sex steroids, so experts decided to use a sample of students for their research into the ...

Trial Shows Alcohol-Mimicking Medication Can Give Laryngeal Dystonia Patients Back Their Voice

Nov. 20, 2024 — Researchers have led a clinical trial of a drug that mimics the effects of alcohol in more than 100 patients with laryngeal dystonia, a neurological condition that causes involuntary muscle spasms in ...

Nov. 18, 2024 — Alcohol-related deaths in the U.S. nearly doubled from 1999 to 2020. The sharpest spike occurred among 25- to 34-year-olds (nearly fourfold), while individuals aged 55 to 64 had the highest rates. ...

Diabetes Medication May Be Effective in Helping People Drink Less Alcohol

Nov. 14, 2024 — New research has found that certain types of medication used to treat diabetes may be effective in reducing alcohol use. The study looked at whether a type of diabetes medication, called GLP-1 ...

Pandemic-Era Increase in Alcohol Use Persists, Research Shows

Nov. 11, 2024 — A new finds that heavy drinking among adult Americans increased more than 20 percent during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic and continued for the following two ...

Alzheimer's and Alcohol Use Disorder Share Similar Gene Expression Patterns, Study Finds

Nov. 5, 2024 — By examining RNA in hundreds of thousands of individual brain cells, scientists further support that alcohol use disorder could accelerate Alzheimer's disease progression, paving the way for ...

Professional Ice Hockey: Depressive Symptoms and Burnout Linked to More Concussions

Oct. 25, 2024 — Elite ice hockey players with a history of concussion report heightened mental health symptoms, according to a new ...

For Heavy Drinkers, Chronic Pain Associated With Alcohol Withdrawal Could Be Permanent

Oct. 17, 2024 — One of the main physical symptoms of alcohol withdrawal is 'allodynia' -- increased sensitivity to mechanical stimuli that are normally innocuous, which is a clinical sign of chronic pain. ...

Students Who Feel More University Connection May Be More Likely to Binge Drink, Study Finds

Oct. 10, 2024 — Mentally healthy college students who felt connected to their university were more likely to binge drink than those who did not feel connected to their university, according to a new ...

Coffee During Pregnancy Safe for Baby's Brain Development, Study Suggests

Oct. 10, 2024 — A new study has failed to find any strong links between drinking coffee during pregnancy and neurodevelopmental difficulties in ...

Arrhythmic Hearts After Excessive Alcohol Consumption

Oct. 9, 2024 — Researchers find cardiac arrhythmias in partygoers who had drunk a lot of ...

Calorie Labels on Alcohol Might Help Some Drinkers Maintain a Healthier Weight

Sep. 19, 2024 — Just over half of heavier drinkers in England say they would make changes to their drinking if calorie labels for alcohol were introduced, according to a new ...

Shrinking the Pint Can Reduce Beer Sales by Almost 10%

Sep. 17, 2024 — Reducing the serving size for beer, lager and cider reduces the volume of those drinks consumed in pubs, bars and restaurants, and could be a useful alcohol control measure, according to a new study. ...

Taking a Trip Down Memory Lane Could Be the Key to Drinking Less Alcohol

Aug. 22, 2024 — A new study suggests recollecting a previous drinking episode could put women off drinking too ...

Study Demonstrates Effective Screening and Intervention for Unhealthy Alcohol Use in Primary Care Settings

Aug. 14, 2024 — A new study could lead to better alcohol use screenings for patients in a primary care ...

Less Sleep and Later Bedtime in Childhood Linked to Future Substance Use

Aug. 13, 2024 — Adolescents were more likely to have consumed alcohol or tried marijuana by age 15 if they had later bedtimes and slept fewer hours during the night during childhood and adolescence, according to a ...

Alcohol Use in Older Adults Doubles Risk of Brain Bleeds from Falls

Aug. 8, 2024 — Little is known about the association between the frequency of alcohol use and the severity of injuries sustained after a fall in older adults. A study of 3,128 older adults who underwent an initial ...