Wine drinking is often associated with luxury and riches, as opposed to beer and other forms of spirit drinking that is linked to the middle class. With each to his or her own lifestyles, does drinking wine and other spirits have any difference when it comes to health benefits?

It has been proven that drinking wine has its benefits, such as helping improve memory and cognitive function, lowering the risk of heart attack and heart diseases, helping with weight management, and reducing the risk of type 2 diabetes.

However, drinking other spirits, more specifically beer, has also shown to provide benefits as well, such as raising the level of anti-oxidants in the blood stream, providing vitamin B6, and reduces the incidence of kidney stones.

In fact, drinking wine is no better than drinking beer, according to a study done by the Research Laboratories at the Fondazione di Ricera e Cura "Giovannia Paolo II," in Campobasso, Italy.

Based on their research, drinking two glasses of wine for men and one glass of wine for women can reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease by up to 31%. But findings also show that drinking slightly more than an English pint a day of beer containing 5% of alcohol also does the trick.

So is there a difference? According to new research done by the Boston University Medical Center, there is. With the many benefits spirits have on their drinkers, researchers confirmed that wine drinkers have a lower risk of cardiovascular disease and mortality when compared to consumers of other beverages.

But surprisingly, it is not because of what they drink, it was the lifestyle of those who drank the spirits. The university's study found that wine consumers, especially in comparison with spirits drinkers, have been shown to have higher levels of education and income, can consume a healthier diet, be more physically active, and have other characteristics that are associated with better health outcomes.

Based on the long-term follow up of 802 older adults, aged 55 to 65, researchers concluded that the associated lifestyle habits and environmental factors of wine consumers largely explained why their health is better.

The plus side is, in addition to the things that the researchers were able to confirm, they confirmed that alcohol consumers do have a lower mortality risk than those who do not drink at all.