Laurie Noreau – The Rumor Detector
Agence Science-Presse (www.sciencepresse.qc.ca)
For some people, the holiday season rhymes with booze, and all options are on the table for how to avoid a hangover. Is abstaining from mixing drinks one way? The Rumor Detector dives into this heady topic.
It must first be noted that it’s the sheer volume of alcohol you drink that is the best way to predict if you’ll suffer from a hangover. The impression that mixing drinks makes a difference comes from two things: on the one hand, consuming a variety of types of alcohol leads partiers to misevaluate their total quantity of alcohol consumed, and underestimate their level of intoxication. And, on the other hand, not all alcohols act with the same intensity.
These Substances Called Congeners
Basically, for the same quantity of alcohol, some choices are better than others to diminish disagreeable symptoms when you awaken the next morning. A 2010 study compared the effects of bourbon and vodka to see which of these two alcohols produced the most intense hangover. Nearly 100 young adults participated in this study. The results: those who consumed bourbon had worse symptoms when they got up than those who had drunk vodka.
Congeners – substances other than the type of alcohol desired – are the likely culprits here. These are the by-products of fermentation, like methanol, acetone and acetaldehyde, as well as certain tannins. These can have toxic effects and can also influence the breaking down of the alcohol by your body. Fermentation in a barrel gives alcohol a dark color, but it also introduces some of these organic compounds into the bottle. Generally, dark alcohols have more elevated levels of congeners than do lighter alcohols in color. Bourbon contains 37 times more of these molecules than vodka.
In theory, we have to blame ethanol for hangovers, as we find that molecule in all alcohols. But the most widely accepted hypothesis now says that when we add congeners to the equation, headaches and nausea are more intense. For example, methanol is metabolized in the same way as ethanol, but enzymes prefer to break down ethanol first. The result is that methanol hangs around in the organism and prolongs the effects of a glass of alcohol.
This hypothesis doesn’t explain everything. Starting in 2008, an American study suggested that some drinkers seem “resistant” to hangovers, no matter what type of alcohol has been drunk – something to do with interaction with the tissue in the digestive tube, which can differ from one person to the other, or the sugar levels in the bloodstream.
And a Danish study carried out with 100 young adults concluded that 3 out of 10 of them didn’t have a hangover, even after drinking “more than 12 glasses.”
On the top of our blacklist, red wine and brandy are generally judged to cause the worst hangovers. And on the other end of our list, an evening of white wine and vodka will generate fewer symptoms when you awaken the next morning.
When it comes to what order it’s preferable to drink in, the logic, independent of the role of congeners, is to start with drinks weakest in alcohol – for example, beer – and work your way up to stronger alcohol, such as vodka or rum. You’ll get intoxicated more slowly, and your judgment will be altered less rapidly as a result.
Verdict
It’s not any mixture of types of alcohol that will make your morning after more difficult. Rather, it is the type or types of alcohol you drink, and above all, the amount you drink. When it comes to drinking different sorts of alcoholic beverages in the same night, it is best to choose those that are weak in congeners.
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This article is part of the Rumor Detective series. Click here for other articles in the series.
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