There was an interesting recent news story from Reuters. Researchers at the University of Missouri-Columbia found that, “Young adults who binge drink frequently are more likely to show disadvantageous decision-making patterns than their peers who don’t drink as heavily” (from the news article). You can’t assume that just because drinking and poor decision making are correlated that the drinking causes the poor decisions (because people who are poorer at decision making in general may drink more) but as I like to say, “Correlation does not imply causation but neither does does it deny causation.”
On the other hand, there is some evidence that drinking alcohol might slow down the progression and/or onset of dementia (e.g., Alzheimer’s Disease): Alcohol and dementia article. Again, the study is correlational so firm causations should not be inferred.
These two articles demonstrate that there is still a lot of uncertainty about the long-term effects of alcohol consumption.
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