Hangover from whisky worse than vodka's

Darker drinks contain high levels of toxic substances called congeners, which is why these result in a shoddier hangover.

Congeners are the by-products of alcohol fermentation, and are render a darker color to the beverage.

"While the alcohol alone is enough to make many people feel sick the next day, these toxic natural substances can add to the ill effects as our body reacts to them," said Damaris Rohsenow, a professor at the Center for Alcohol and Addiction Studies at Brown University.

Details of the study
To reach their conclusions, researchers conducted a study on 95 adults, both men and women, aged 21-33 who were heavy drinkers but had no history of alcohol abuse.

For the study, these subjects spent two nights at the Boston test facility center. They were given enough alcohol to reach a level of drunkenness just below the illegal mark.

All the participants were also given standardized meals three hours prior to consuming alcohol.

On the first night, one group of participants was given vodka and the other bourbon--an American whisky--mixed in cola, and on the second night the participants were given a placebo--cola with tonic water and a little vodka or bourbon.

On both the occasions, the participants were asked how they felt the next morning. They were also examined on how well they could concentrate on different cognitive tasks requiring attention and speedy response.

Whisky hangover found to be worse
Those who consumed bourbon exhibited far more severe hangover symptoms like headache, nausea, fatigue, loss of appetite and thirst than their counterparts who drank vodka or tonic water. All these alcohol drinkers reported feeling much worse than others.

The researchers also found, with the help of sleep monitors, that both the groups slept poorly in the night.

The next morning when the participants had to perform certain cognitive tests, they exhibited a shorter attention span and performed worse than the non-drinkers or those who consumed vodka.

Rohsenow said, "While alcohol in the beverage did increase how hung over people reported feeling the next morning compared to drinking a placebo, bourbon made people feel even worse than vodka did."

Hangover impaired judgment in all drinkers
While analyzing their concentration levels, researchers came across an intriguing fact, and found that regardless of whether a participant had consumed bourbon or vodka, it had no effect on their concentration or performance.

This finding implied that both the drinks resulted in an equal level of cognitive impairment among all the participants who drank either of the drink.

"While people felt worse, they didn't perform worse after bourbon (a type of whisky made in the US) than after vodka. Bourbon versus vodka didn't make a difference; the biggest thing was the alcohol itself," Rohsenow added.

Researchers recommended that people should avoid heavy consumption of alcohol, as it may damage the liver or cause cancer and cardiovascular events.

The study will be published in next year’s March issue of the journal Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research.