It is worth noting, while outside the general scope of this review, that chronic alcohol use does result in structural and/or functional atrophy in regions outside of the PFC and hippocampus and that these additional changes cannot be eliminated as potential modulators of the deleterious effects observed in the PFC and hippocampus (23). Further, research into the cognitive capacities of alcoholic individuals has identified cognitive disorders, such as Wernicke–Korsakoff syndrome, alcohol dementia, and Marchiafava–Bignami disease, which are directly related to long-term alcohol abuse and cloud our understanding of alcohol’s solitary effects on cognitive functioning (24, 25). Similarly, age and concurrent drug use can additionally complicate our understanding of alcohol’s impact; therefore, for the purpose of this review, studies including subjects with chronic alcohol use without poly drug use were evaluated.
