Youthful drinking changes the adult brain

The adult brain that was awash in alcohol during its formative years looks different and acts differently than an adult brain that skipped the youthful binge drinking, says a new study conducted on rats.

All grown up, the brain exposed to periodic alcoholic benders during adolescence and young adulthood shows persistent abnormalities in the structure and function of the hippocampus, the region most closely associated with learning and memory. The specific changes seen in adult rats who were regularly plied with alcohol during the brain’s development generally result in memory problems and neuropsychiatric impairments such as attention and judgment problems and ability to learn new skills.

Read more from the Los Angeles Times.