Midlife women focus more on alcohol’s immediate health impacts than longer-term risks, a new study shows.
Women manage the immediate health impacts of alcohol, but pay less attention to long-term risks such as cancer, according to new research out of Waipapa Taumata Rau, University of Auckland.
Dr Kate Kersey, a research fellow in the Centre for Addiction Research, interviewed 50 New Zealand women aged 35 to 60, both individually and in friendship groups, to explore how they understand and manage their drinking. See Psychology and Health: https://doi.org/10.1080/08870446.2026.2650785
Overall, 29 women (58 percent) drank at least twice a week, and 25 women (50 percent) typically drank three or more drinks on each occasion.
“There was a strong sense of expert knowledge in how participants talked about what alcohol does to the body,” says Kersey. “They spoke frequently about its negative effects on sleep quality, energy levels and weight.
“Interestingly, they did not talk much about long-term health effects such as heart disease or cancer. However, consistent with our other research, some participants said that if they were to develop cancer, they would feel deeply guilty, worrying that alcohol might have contributed.”
Kersey says these understandings reflect our current social context, where people are expected to take individual responsibility for successful lives and good health.
“If you are expected to be a ‘good’, productive citizen – you need to have the energy to perform well at work and stay fit and healthy.
The study also analysed women’s answers through a gendered lens. Today’s ‘empowered’ midlife women are expected to put effort into being a good mother and career women, into looking after themselves and others, and into ‘looking good’.
This was evident in how women in this study often framed drinking-related harms as something that could be managed through knowledge, careful monitoring and self-discipline – for example by tracking consumption through apps, investing in their health, and maintaining a slim body.
“They described doing a lot of exercise, with a strong sense that this was compensating for the effects of alcohol. However, we know that exercise does not always counteract alcohol’s harms, particularly its carcinogenic properties,” Kersey says.
The research focused primarily on middle-class Pākehā women, and Kersey notes that further work is needed with different communities and demographics.
Within this sample, however, most participants believed that they were ‘responsible’ about their drinking – a term Kersey sees as highly flexible and individualised.
“Everybody has a different idea of what being ‘responsible’ means when it comes to drinking,” she says. “For some people, that can still involve drinking quite large amounts – half a bottle of wine a night, or even a bottle.
“And if they are still doing their lives ‘right’ – working, parenting, exercising – they are less worried about their consumption.”
Kersey describes this as drinking within an ‘alcohol-genic environment’, where responsibility is placed on individuals to manage their drinking while alcohol remains widely available and heavily promoted.
“The industry pushes the framing of ‘drinking responsibly’, as does the government, because alcohol is a prized economic activity in our society.”
She argues that policy changes are needed like those that successfully reduced smoking-related harm: higher pricing, reduced availability, and strong regulation of marketing.
Kersey also emphasises the need for gender-responsive alcohol policy.
“One of the worst developments was alcohol being sold in supermarkets where the majority of shoppers are women, and where it’s seen like any other grocery item,” she says. “But alcohol is not a food product – it’s a psychoactive substance that can cause significant harm.”
Alcohol companies also increasingly target women through marketing that links drinking with health and self-care (relaxation, pleasure, social connection). Drinks labelled as low-sugar or low-carb also target women’s desire to maintain slim bodies.
Overall, the study shows that women’s drinking practices do not exist in a neutral environment.
“They are socially shaped, deeply gendered, and strongly influenced by powerful commercial interests,” Kersey says.
“If we want to reduce alcohol-related harm, we need to move beyond individual responsibility and address the wider systems that normalise New Zealand’s drinking culture.”
