What do your drinking habits say about you?

Over the past couple of decades, quite a few studies have suggested that drinking alcohol in moderation is good for your health. Then came the more surprising twist: perhaps moderate drinkers are healthier than teetotallers because many of the abstainers gave up due to alcoholism or other long-term health problems. Now a recent study with better methodology has cast new light on this old question: is it healthier to drink or abstain?

How often do you drink alcohol: (a) daily or almost daily, (b) once or twice per week, (c) once or twice per month, (d) never (no alcohol at all in the past 12 months)?

If you said (a) then – on average – you are more than twice as likely to live to at least 85, with no cognitive impairments, than (d) a non-drinker who is similar to you in terms of factors such as smoking, exercise, weight, medical conditions, medications, marital status and depression. In second place, if you said (b) or (c) you are slightly less than twice as likely (1.76 or 1.85 times respectively) as a non-drinker to make it to 85 unimpaired. Cheers!

These were the findings of a new longitudinal study’ll (led by Erin Richard at the University of California, San Diego) which assessed alcohol intake in the mid-1980s, then followed up the participants as far as 2009. One health warning, though: the participants were already of retirement age at the start of the study. It remains to be seen if near-daily drinking has a positive or negative effect on health when begun earlier in life (and, of course, excessive drinking is seriously harmful to your health whatever your age).

Are You Smarter Than a Chimpanzee? by Ben Ambridge is published by Profile Books, £12.99. Order it for £11.04 at bookshop.theguardian.com