We all lose some mental sharpness as we age, but men who drink heavily at midlife can expect a steeper, faster decline in memory and thinking skills a decade down the road, a new study suggests.

The study, published Wednesday in the journal Neurology, defines heavy drinking for men as more than 36 grams of alcohol a day, the equivalent of 2.5 drinks. Men who drink less or don’t drink at all still lose some cognitive ground, the researchers say, but not as much. The study looked at women but found no clear results for them. …

Some studies even suggest light or moderate drinking might be better for aging brains than abstinence, but the new study did not show that, she says. There was a hint that non-drinking women fared worse than moderate drinkers, but there were not enough abstaining women in the study to make the results convincing, Sabia says. The study suggested faster cognitive declines for female heavy drinkers, but those results were not statistically significant.