Aug 18, 2010 09:41 GMT  ·  By

People that moderately drink alcohol, especially wine, have better performances at cognitive tests, a prospective study of 5033 men and women in the Tromsø Study in northern Norway reports.

Wine has several antioxidants, or polyphenols, and other substances that help reduce cognitive decline caused by aging.

Scientists found that better cognitive functions were also favored by alcohol's positive effects on arteriosclerosis (hardening of the arteries), coagulation (thickening of the blood and clotting), and reducing inflammation (of artery walls, improving blood flow).

The test subjects that had an average age of 58 years and never suffered from stroke, were followed for over 7 years, during which they took a wide range of cognitive tests.

A lower risk of a poor testing score was observed for women that consumed wine at least 4 or more times in two weeks, compared to those that drank less than one time during the same period.

Other poor cognitive functioning risk factors were associated, as expected, with older people, smokers, less educated people and those suffering from diabetes, depression or hypertension.

Another study conclusion was that women that did not drink at all, also had an importantly lower cognitive performance.

This study was adjusted for age, weight, education, depression and cardiovascular disease, but did not take into consideration other lifestyle habits that could affect cognitive function, like diet, income or profession.

If be believe that well-balanced people do moderate things, then the authors' conclusion seems perfectly logic: “A positive effect of wine . . . could also be due to confounders such as socio-economic status and more favorable dietary and other lifestyle habits.

This is not the first study on this topic, as in the last thirty years, 68 studies on the relationship between moderate alcohol intake and cognitive function, were carried out on 145,308 men and women from various populations and with different drinking patterns.

The majority showed that a moderate alcohol consumption improved the cognitive function and reduced the risk of dementia and of Alzheimer's disease.