Can Being Tired or Drunk Affect Your IQ?

19 Oct, 2022
Can Being Tired or Drunk Affect Your IQ?

How Does Being Tired Affect IQ?

Successive sleep deprivation affects a person’s intelligence as concentration lowers every time one gets less than 5 hours of sleep. Poor sleep detracts from effective thinking since it causes stress that activates the cortisol hormone, which makes people tired and less capable of optimal cognitive performance.

Thus, allowing our bodies to have sufficient rest fuels our brains with memory, concentration, and focus, which are a prerequisite for most learning.

How Does Being Drunk Affect IQ?

Drunkenness affects IQ briefly or permanently. Under the influence of alcohol, a person’s capacity to plan, initiate and alter goal-directed behavior is mostly, if not all, impaired. Alcohol, when consumed excessively in young adulthood, is extremely harmful as the brain doesn’t fully develop until age 25. The worst scenario is anyone drinking heavily at 12 years old will likely develop an alcohol-use disorder in later life and may adversely affect cognitive ability. Healthier life choices can help the person reach his genetic potential IQ level at around age 20-25.