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Study shows that binge drinking may cause brain damage
By Staff Writer
 According to the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, binge drinking involves increasing one's blood alcohol concentration to 0.08 or above. Usually this means that men consume five or more drinks and women have four or more drinks in about two hours. A new study by researchers at the University at Cincinnati shows that teens who participate in this behavior may be doing serious damage to their brains, which are still not fully developed. In order to arrive at this conclusion, researchers took high-resolution brains scans of 29 individuals between the ages of 18 and 25 who binge drink on the weekends. The results showed that this drinking habit is linked to cortical-thinning of the pre-frontal cortex. This part of the brain plays a role in emotions, impulse control, making decisions, paying attention and processing emotions. According to one of the researchers, previous brain scans indicated that binge drinking may cause reduced integrity in white matter. However, the recent study shows that gray matter may be affected differently from this habit. Teens who need help getting their alcohol addictions under control may want to consider enrolling in troubled teenagers programs.
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