There’s a long-held belief that people drink alcohol in excess to drown their sorrows. But recent research into mood and drinking has found the opposite is also true.

Using data from 69 studies (12,394 people in total) in the US, Canada, France and Australia, all of which employed surveys to assess mood and drinking levels, the researchers found no evidence that people drank more on days when they felt down. Rather surprisingly, however, people tended to drink – and drink heavily – on days when they were in a good mood.

The authors found that participants were between 6% and 28% more likely to drink on days they were in a good mood, and 17%-23% more likely to binge drink (having more than four or five drinks within a few hours) on these days.

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