A new study shows that heavy drinking among adolescents could be dangerous for the still-developing brain, HealthScout reported May 13.

“The frontal lobe, where our brain does things like planning and
problem-solving and judgment, is still developing until we turn 16,” said Dr. Susan Tapert, a psychiatric research fellow at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD). “Drinking heavily during this time could mean life-long problems.

Tapert and colleagues arrived at their conclusions after conducting a variety of thinking and memory tests on 15- and 16-year-old problem drinkers and non-drinkers.

“The alcoholics performed more poorly in trying to remember the information we had just taught them,” Tapert said. “While most of the non-drinking kids remembered 95 percent of the information, the drinkers remembered only 85 percent. That would be the difference between an A and B grade or a C and D.” Researchers found that problems with memory intensified if adolescents continued drinking.