Pausing drinking for a month after the excesses of the holiday season – otherwise known as Dry January – has become a popular New Year’s resolution. And this year, even as the stress of the pandemic and a new variant might make a nightcap even more tempting, experts say it’s still worth taking time to reevaluate your drinking in the new year.
“With the pandemic, what the research is telling us is that people are using substances, in general, more,” said Erin Goodhart, the senior clinical director of women’s services at Caron Treatment Centers, a substance-use treatment program with several facilities in the Philadelphia region.
Although some people do quit drinking entirely after a month of abstinence, many use Dry January as a jumping-off point to explore drinking habits and modify them as necessary. “One of the benefits of Dry January is using it as a way to maybe look at some of your substance use or drinking and developing new habits,” Goodhart said.
There’s not an extensive body of research on Dry January itself, but some studies show that quitting drinking for a month can have health benefits, Patricia Powell, the deputy director of the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, wrote in an email. A 2016 study on more than 800 adults in the United Kingdom who undertook a Dry January found that most participants drank less and got drunk less frequently afterward, Powell said.
Many Dry January participants try to abstain from alcohol entirely for a month, but any reduction in drinking can be beneficial, said Henry Kranzler, a physician and director of the Center for Studies of Addiction at the University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine. Some participants might quit drinking during the week or simply reduce their alcohol consumption generally.