A photo circulating on social media in November 2024 allegedly shows the impact of alcohol on the human brain. The image includes two brains, one labeled as the "drinker's brain" and the other as the "non-drinker's brain."
Text accompanying the image advocated against alcohol. For example, one Nov. 25 X post said that abstaining from the substance would "fix your dopamine-saturated brain permanently."
(X user @HarmonyHaven_1)
As of this writing, that X post has amassed more than 577,000 views, while a similar one posted days earlier has garnered more than 4.2 million views. The picture has also appeared on Instagram and Threads.
Google's reverse image search results showed that the photo first surfaced in 2022 as a thumbnail for a YouTube video titled: "How Alcohol Affects The Human Brain (SCIENCE EXPLAINED)." We reached out to the user who posted the footage to ask if they created the picture or for any details about its origin. We will update this article if we receive a response.
However, the image does not actually depict one brain from someone who consumed a lot of alcohol and another brain from someone who did not. Instead, the purported drinker's brain is actually an image of a 2,600-year-old preserved brain that was discovered by U.K. archaeologists in 2008. Meanwhile, the alleged non-drinker's brain is a stock image that is available on stock photo websites. It does not show an actual brain but instead a model or digital creation of one.
One Pic Shows a 2,600-Year-Old Brain
The picture purportedly showing the effects of alcohol — that is, the "drinker's brain" — originated from a 2020 research paper published in the Journal of the Royal Society Interface.
The paper, titled "Protein aggregate formation permits millennium-old brain preservation," focused on the preservation of the brain discovered by archaeologists with the U.K.'s York Archaeological Trust. The research examined why the brain's structure had remained intact for millennia.
Below is a screenshot from the research paper. The in-question photograph can be seen in the bottom right corner.
(Royal Society Publishing)
The caption of the image in question, labeled (e), reads: "Careful removal of the sediment uncovers a surface resembling the gyri of a human brain." Axel Petzold, the study's lead author, said via email that he took the picture.
The research makes no mention of the impact of alcohol on the human brain.
The alleged non-drinker's brain is a generic stock image that exists on various stock photo websites, such as Adobe Stock and Alamy.com. It's unknown whether the picture depicts a physical model of a brain or a digital creation. The origin of the photo is also unknown.
The brain-comparison image was not the first rumor about the organ that Snopes has fact-checked. We have investigated whether an image accurately depicts a 1 cubic millimeter sample of the human brain and we have debunked false claims that radiation from Bluetooth earbuds, such as AirPods, causes brain cancer.