Many of us have heard of the so-called “ beer goggle ” effect. It’s the phenomenon that occurs when someone’s had a few alcoholic drinks and suddenly, all of those people who looked semi-attractive on entering the bar look really, really appealing.
Scientists have shown that it’s not just a lowering of standards – alcohol actually stimulates the part of the brain that judges facial attractiveness. In 2002, researchers at St. Andrews University and Glasgow University in Scotland took 80 college students and had half of them drink a “ moderate ” amount of alcohol – between one and four servings, depending on gender and body weight.
The other half, the control group, remained sober. Scientists showed each subject pictures of people of the opposite sex. In all cases – male and female alike – the experimental (tipsy) group rated each picture an average of 25 % more attractive than the sober group did.
The effect can reportedly be traced to the nucleus accumbens. When you’re looking at another human being, the nucleus accumbens is the area of the brain that decides how attractive that human being’s face is. If you look at, say, George Clooney or Angelina Jolie, this area of your brain probably experiences increased neural firing. In other words, it’s stimulated. As it turns out, alcohol, all by itself, stimulates the nucleus accumbens. So when you’ve have a few drinks, and you look at a face you may have judged as unattractive when you were sober, your brain, under the influence of alcohol, tells you that this face is in fact somewhat attractive. And the increase in perceived attractive seems to be directly proportional to the amount of alcohol consumed.
In a more recent study, this one conducted by researchers at England’s Manchester University in 2005, scientists actually came up with a mathematical formula to calculate the extent of the “beer goggle” effect on a given individual in a given situation. Their reasoning for creating this formula is that alcohol is not really the only factor affecting the drunken perception of beauty. Other factors, according to their research, include:
- How brightly lit the area is
- The observer’s eye-sight quality
- The amount of smoke in the air
- The distance of the observer from the observed
- The formula goes like this:
The formula goes like this:
Where:
- An is the number of servings of alcohol,
- S is the smokiness of the area on a scale of 0 – 10,
- L is the lighting level of the area, measured in candelas per square meter, in which 150 is normal room lightning,
- Vo is Snellen visual acuity, in which 6/6 is normal and 6/12 is the lower limit at which someone is able to drive and
- d is the distance between the observer and the observed, measured in meters.
The formula works out a “beer goggle” score ranging from 1 to 100+. When ß = 1, the observer is perceiving the same degree of beauty he or she would perceive in a sober state. At 100+, everybody in the room is a perfect 10 .
Now that is a beautiful formula. Nice article too, thanks.
I use another formula:
A = B x U /S
In which:
A = Attractiveness
B = Number of beers
U = Sexual Urgency (1 to 10)
S = Cash for sex
So the higher A is, the more attractive they are thanks to the alcohol.
But what explains why people think liberalism is so pretty? They can’t all be drunk.
The next successful beer’s catchphrase will be, “Now, proven NOT to stimulate your nucleus accumbens!”
More you drink, the better I look.
Man, units don’t match for that formula.
If you want to play around with the equation I have created a simple page using http://instacalc.com that allows you to do so with ease.
I was always wondering why I had sex with the Lizard Lady and so many really ugly, overweight and heinous girls. Now I know that it was my old friend Jack Daniels who was talking me into doing things with some of the god’s ugliest creatures. I can’t help myself, but I love liquor and pigs.
Guys guys guys – it doesn’t matter how many boffins you use to create a formula to try and justify this sort of thing, but let’s face it – sleeping with ugly people will always remain a social sin!
Happy drinking punks!
K.
There is another factor that you need to bring into play in this analysis, the Cunningham-Isherwood law.
Brains * Beauty * Availability = k
I’m not sure of the interaction between this and the effect of alcohol. There needs to be more research funded to figure this out.
If it werent for beer my there would be a lot less rednecks.
If you drank zero beers, your score would be 0 not 1. So all sober people must have a pretty scary time walking down the streets seeing only ugly people. Glad I am never sober.
So what is the formula for those who are drunk and think themselves attractive?! ‘Cause we’ve all seen them strutting their stuff…and begged them not to!
Its not our that we are ugly god just wasn,t good to we can,t be all cindy crawfords.
Be ugly is not fun its horribe to look at to be point at and reject by every guy in the world.you blokes are so shallow you need to look in the mirror being honest with youselves because not yee are as good looking as you think you are .SO THERE
Nice one Louise…I’d give you 10/10 for grammar after 6 beers!
Yeah, I know what you mean. Before I got married I had sex with tons of fat and ugly girls. After a while it became normal. Now whenever I have sex with my wife I fantasize about some of those chicks, especially Lee Lawlor…
Sorry, but as a neuroscientist i can tell you that this argument falls apart on many levels. The nucleus accumbens mediates the anticipation or prediction of a reward.
All drugs of abuse ‘activate’ the nucleus accumbens. Facial recognition is processed in a totally different area(s) of the brain. maybe the n. accumbens lights up after your facial recognition area has misfired and you think you’re going to get lucky ….
Men are the shallows creatures in the earth. No matter what advice they give out about guys not being shallow itm, s crap. when a guy does n,t fancy you he doesn,t no matter what do. If your are ugly you are distant to be rejected all your life and end up alone and unloved.
“Guys guys guys – it doesn’t matter how many boffins you use to create a formula to try and justify this sort of thing, but let’s face it – sleeping with ugly people will always remain a social sin! Happy drinking punks! L.”
And that leaves Krishna to be the most sinful person in town!
Chris, are you a girl? if ya are, come on over and i’ll make you feel beautiful. p.s. bring a six pack.
Were you drunk when you wrote this? Clooney or Angelina Jolie shouldn’t appeal to anyone in their right mind. If anything, looking at their faces all day on TV causes neurons to stop firing.
I too disagree with this formula a bit. One of the most obvious things for me, about drunkenly sleeping with all manner of pigs, is that ugly people are more likely to warmly embrace you because they are so used to being rejected. Also when you are intoxicated you will naturally want to gravitate towards the people who seem as though they will return your affections. eg: uglies, fuglies, nuglies, and even the dreaded dragunufuglies. Now if youll excuse me im gonna go chug some yager and have sex with my ugly girlfriend.
When my wife is out of town. I get really baked, then go to a nightclub. I look for the fattest girl, because she is an easy target. Then I can join the 300 club!