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April 25 2012
NCBI ROFL: Wish you could get drunk without blacking out? Next time, have a coffee.
Alcohol-induced retrograde memory impairment in rats: prevention by caffeine.
“RATIONALE:
Ethanol and caffeine are two of the most widely consumed drugs in the world, often used in the same setting. Animal models may help to understand the conditions under which incidental memories formed just before ethanol intoxication might be lost or become difficult to retrieve.
OBJECTIVES:
Ethanol-induced retrograde amnesia was investigated using a new odor-recognition test.
MATERIALS AND METHODS:
Rats thoroughly explored a wood bead taken from the cage of another rat, and habituated to this novel odor (N1) over three trials. Immediately following habituation, rats received saline, 25 mg/kg pentylenetetrazol (a seizure-producing agent known to cause retrograde amnesia) to validate the test, 1.0 g/kg ethanol, or 3.0 g/kg ethanol. The next day, they were presented again with N1 and also a bead from a new rat’s cage (N2).
RESULTS:
Rats receiving saline or the lower dose of ethanol showed overnight memory for N1, indicated by preferential exploration of N2 over N1. Rats receiving pentylenetetrazol or the higher dose of ethanol appeared not to remember N1, in that they showed equal exploration of N1 and N2. Caffeine (5 mg/kg), delivered either ...
April 20 2012
NCBI ROFL: If you want to sell more alcohol, touch your customers.
The effect of waitresses’ touch on alcohol consumption in dyads.
“A total of 96 men and 48 women participated in a study on the effect of touch in the natural setting of public taverns in the United States. Participants in the same-gender (men-men) or mixed-gender dyads were either touched or not touched by waitress confederates. Regardless of dyad type, participants who were touched consumed more alcohol than participants who were not touched. Men in the mixed-gender dyads consumed more alcohol when the women was touched. Same-gender (men-men) dyads aggregately consumed more alcohol than mixed-gender dyads. The results are interpreted in terms of the environmental cues and the dynamics of the group.”
Photo: flickr/zoonabar
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NCBI ROFL. Real articles. Funny subjects.
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April 04 2012
NCBI ROFL: Social drinking in a simulated tavern: an experimental analysis.
“Five groups of five male social drinkers, who frequently drank with one another, were observed during a 30-min drinking period in an experimental tavern. Audio/video tapes of each session were rated by two observers for onset and duration of drinking and talking using a computer scoring system. Drinking was found to follow a negatively accelerating function, with session intakes correlated with reported weekly drinking. Group talking was found to increase during the session, supporting previous reports of increased socialization following drinking. Drinking patterns and intakes were found to be comparable to some of the observations from naturalistic tavern settings suggesting that the simulated tavern is an appropriate environment in which to study drinking consequences.”
Photo: Wikimedia/Jmabel
Related content:
Discoblog: NCBI ROFL: Oktoberfest week: Development of a simulated drinking game procedure to study risky alcohol use.
Discoblog: NCBI ROFL: A field study of bar-sponsored drink specials and their associations with patron intoxication.
Discoblog: NCBI ROFL: Naturalistic observations of beer drinking among college students.
NCBI ROFL. Real articles. Funny subjects.
Read our FAQ!
February 22 2012
NCBI ROFL: A field study of bar-sponsored drink specials and their associations with patron intoxication.
“OBJECTIVE:
The study examined associations between bar-sponsored drink specials and alcohol intoxication at the patron level.
METHOD:
Data were collected in a college bar district located in a large campus community in the southeastern United States. Random and self-selected samples of patrons were interviewed after exiting college bars at night on four different nights (N=383). Anonymous interview and questionnaire data were collected as well as breath alcohol concentration (BrAC) readings.
RESULTS:
Significant gender differences existed in patron drinking practices. Women were more likely to take advantage of drink specials, whereas men reported greater alcohol expenditures, consumed more drinks, and drank for longer periods of time. Gender differences in BrAC were very small and not meaningful. Patrons who did not take advantage of drink specials reported consuming more drinks before bar entry than patrons who did participate in these promotions. Participation in “all-you-can-drink” promotions was significantly associated with higher BrAC readings after adjusting for covariates and random effects attributable to drinking establishment. Other drink specials did not have significant associations with alcohol intoxication.
CONCLUSIONS:
The all-you-can-drink special may be the specific discounting practice ...
February 07 2012
NCBI ROFL: Superbowl special: 5 funny football-related studies!
1. Sports fans who tailgate are more likely to get drunk.
”Our findings suggest that a significant number of attendees at professional sporting events may have elevated BAC levels, particularly young adults and those who participated in tailgating activities. ”
2. Sport fan identification in obituaries.
“To assess whether sport involvement, particularly as a fan, is central enough to one’s self-concept to be mentioned in obituary content, it was hypothesized that a greater proportion of men’s obituaries than women’s would mention the deceased individual’s sport fan identification.”
3. Choose wisely, rooting for the winning team DOES make you more manly.
“In both studies, mean testosterone level increased in the fans of winning teams and decreased in the fans of losing teams. These findings suggest that watching one’s heroes win or lose has physiological consequences that extend beyond changes in mood and self-esteem.”
4. The “Fan Can”: innocent football fan fun, or menace to sober society?
“Participants were exposed to images of beer in either a standard can or a can featuring the colors of their university (i.e., ‘fan cans’). We hypothesized that exposure to fan cans would change ...
January 05 2012
NCBI ROFL: Naturalistic observations of beer drinking among college students.
“We observed the beer drinking behavior of 308 university students in several bar and party settings. The following relationships were found: males drinking beer in bars consumed 0.92 oz per min; females drank less beer than males, and stayed in a bar for a longer time period; patrons drank significantly more beer when drinking in groups and when purchasing beer in pitchers versus cups or bottles; and intervals between party arrival and first drink and between party departure and last drink varied inversely with blood alcohol concentration. We discuss these findings with regard to developing interventions to prevent alcohol-impaired driving.”
Photo: Flickr/.A.A.
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WTF is NCBI ROFL? Read our FAQ!
October 20 2011
NCBI ROFL: On why I drink so much.
Alcohol selectively impairs negative self-relevant associations in young drinkers.
“The stress-dampening effects of alcohol have been attributed to ‘appraisal disruption’- decreased ability of stimuli to evoke threatening associations in memory. Appraisal disruption could apply to oneself as well as situational stimuli. This question was investigated in undergraduate drinkers (n = 90/Gender) with low or high anxiety sensitivity (AS; n = 90/AS Group), a trait linked with hyper-vigilance to threat. Subjects received alcohol (0.7 g/kg males; 0.63 g/kg females), placebo or soft drink and performed a speech about their appearance. Sequence of drink administration and speech advisory (threat) was manipulated between subjects: Threat before Drink, Threat after Drink, No-Threat Control. The Implicit Association Test measured self-relevant associations based upon time to classify positive and negative attribute words (e.g. Cute, Ugly) paired with self-relevant or non-self-relevant object words (e.g. Me, Them). Alcohol selectively slowed negative self-relevant decisions, regardless of other factors. Relative fluency of negative versus positive decisions (D) correlated inversely with state anxiety and systolic blood pressure immediately before speech performance, and correlated directly with severity of alcohol problems. These findings are consistent with the Appraisal Disruption hypothesis. Preferential impairment of negative self-relevant associations may decrease perceived vulnerability under alcohol and increase risk for alcohol problems in young drinkers.”
Photo: flickr/TheeErin
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WTF is NCBI ROFL? Read our FAQ!
August 12 2011
NCBI ROFL: Beer goggles explained!
It’s booze week on NCBI ROFL! All this week we’ll be featuring articles about ethanol, ethyl alcohol, and even CH3CH2OH. Enjoy!
An explanation for enhanced perceptions of attractiveness after alcohol consumption.
“Acute alcohol consumption increases ratings of attractiveness to faces. This may help to explain increased frequencies of sexual encounters during periods of alcohol intoxication. At least in part, such increased attraction may be the result of alcohol consumption decreasing ability to detect bilateral asymmetry, presumably because of the reductions in the levels of visual function. We tested the hypotheses that acute alcohol consumption decreases ability to detect asymmetry in faces and reduces preference for symmetrical faces over asymmetrical faces. Twenty images of a pair of faces and then 20 images of a single face were displayed on a computer, one at a time. Participants were instructed to state which face of each of the face pairs displayed was most attractive and then whether the single face being displayed was symmetrical or not. Data were collected near campus bars at Roehampton University. Sixty-four self-selecting students who undertook the study were classified as either sober (control) or intoxicated with ...
August 11 2011
NCBI ROFL: Dear Lord, please give me a drink.
It’s booze week on NCBI ROFL! All this week we’ll be featuring articles about ethanol, ethyl alcohol, and even CH3CH2OH. Enjoy!
Invocations and intoxication: does prayer decrease alcohol consumption?
“Four methodologically diverse studies (N = 1,758) show that prayer frequency and alcohol consumption are negatively related. In Study 1 (n = 824), we used a cross-sectional design and found that higher prayer frequency was related to lower alcohol consumption and problematic drinking behavior. Study 2 (n = 702) used a longitudinal design and found that more frequent prayer at Time 1 predicted less alcohol consumption and problematic drinking behavior at Time 2, and this relationship held when controlling for baseline levels of drinking and prayer. In Study 3 (n = 117), we used an experimental design to test for a causal relationship between prayer frequency and alcohol consumption. Participants assigned to pray every day (either an undirected prayer or a prayer for a relationship partner) for 4 weeks drank about half as much alcohol at the conclusion of the study as control participants. Study 4 (n = 115) replicated the findings of Study 3, as prayer again reduced drinking by about half. ...
August 10 2011
NCBI ROFL: The Big, the Bad, and the Boozed-Up.
It’s booze week on NCBI ROFL! All this week we’ll be featuring articles about ethanol, ethyl alcohol, and even CH3CH2OH. Enjoy!
The Big, the Bad, and the Boozed-Up: Weight Moderates the Effect of Alcohol on Aggression.
“Most people avoid the “big, drunk guy” in bars because they don’t want to get assaulted. Is this stereotype supported by empirical evidence? Unfortunately, no scientific work has investigated this topic. Based on the recalibrational theory of anger and embodied cognition theory, we predicted that heavier men would behave the most aggressively when intoxicated. In two independent experiments (Ns= 553 and 327, respectively), participants consumed either alcohol or placebo beverages and then completed an aggression task in which they could administer painful electric shocks to a fictitious opponent. Both experiments showed that weight interacted with alcohol and gender to predict the highest amount of aggression among intoxicated heavy men. The results suggest that an embodied cognition approach is useful in understanding intoxicated aggression. Apparently there is a kernel of truth in the stereotype of the “big, drunk, aggressive guy.”"
Photo: flickr/ peretzp
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August 09 2011
NCBI ROFL: The “Fan Can”: innocent football fan fun, or menace to sober society?
It’s booze week on NCBI ROFL! All this week we’ll be featuring articles about ethanol, ethyl alcohol, and even CH3CH2OH. Enjoy!
The Color of Safety: Ingroup Associated Colors make Beer Safer.
“Individuals display high levels of trust and express feelings of safety when interacting with social ingroup members. Here, we investigated whether cues related to ingroup membership would change perceptions of the safety of alcohol. Participants were exposed to images of beer in either a standard can or a can featuring the colors of their university (i.e., ‘fan cans’). We hypothesized that exposure to fan cans would change perceptions of the risks of beer drinking. Results showed that participants exposed to fan cans rated beer consumption as less dangerous (Experiment 1), were more likely to automatically activate safety-related mental content after unconscious perception of beer cues (Experiment 2), and viewed their ingroup’s party practices as less dangerous (Experiment 3). These results provide evidence that ingroup-associated colors can serve as a safety cue for alcohol, which may in theory perpetuate alcohol-related risk-taking, already a cause for concern on college and university campuses.”
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August 08 2011
NCBI ROFL: Want to cure your malaria? Get wasted!
It’s booze week on NCBI ROFL! All this week we’ll be featuring articles about ethanol, ethyl alcohol, and even CH3CH2OH. Enjoy!
Effect of alcohol on growth of Plasmodium falciparum.
“The effect of ethanol on the in vitro growth of the malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum was investigated. 17 mM (0.08%) and 85 mM (0.39%) ethanol were added to parasite cultures and growth was determined for six days. A significant growth inhibition for both ethanol concentrations was observed on each day. It reached 65% for 85 mM ethanol after six days of incubation. Malarial parasites are strongly inhibited by ethanol concentrations which are attainable by extensive alcohol consumption.”
Photo: flickr/cyclonebill
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July 29 2011
NCBI ROFL: The effects of acute ethanol consumption on sexual response and sexual risk-taking intent.
“Two theories of sexual risk taking (disinhibition and alcohol myopia) were tested using genital measures of sexual response and computer measures of sexual risk propensity. A total of 44 men and women completed two sessions comparing responses to erotic films while consuming alcohol (breath alcohol doses were .025 g/kg and .08 g/kg) or juice alone. After consuming alcohol, more sexual arousal was reported in response to neutral films and at a breath alcohol level of .08 g/kg as compared to no alcohol. Genital responses for men and women increased during sexual films, but men did not respond as strongly when breath alcohol level was .08 g/kg. Intentions to have intercourse with a new partner at baseline predicted the level of sexual arousal reported. As self-reported sexual arousal increased in response to sexual films and higher alcohol dose, the intent to engage in intercourse with a new partner increased. Alcohol dose was not related to later sexual intercourse intentions. With no direct relationship of alcohol and intercourse intentions, results appear more consistent with a disinhibition model of sexual arousal.”
Photo: flickr/ albany_tim
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May 04 2011
NCBI ROFL: What? I can’t get drunk from soaking my feet in vodka? :(
Testing the validity of the Danish urban myth that alcohol can be absorbed through feet: open labelled self experimental study
“Objective: To determine the validity of the Danish urban myth that it is possible to get drunk by submerging feet in alcohol… The primary end point was the concentration of plasma ethanol (detection limit 2.2 mmol/L (10 mg/100 mL)), measured every 30 minutes for three hours while feet were submerged in a washing-up bowl containing the contents of three 700 mL bottles of vodka. The secondary outcome was self assessment of intoxication related symptoms (self confidence, urge to speak, and number of spontaneous hugs), scored on a scale of 0 to 10. Plasma ethanol concentrations were below the detection limit of 2.2 mmol/L (10 mg/100 mL) throughout the experiment. No significant changes were observed in the intoxication related symptoms, although self confidence and urge to speak increased slightly at the start of the study, probably due to the setup. Our results suggest that feet are impenetrable to the alcohol component of vodka. We therefore conclude that the Danish urban myth of being able to get drunk by submerging feet ...
March 28 2011
NCBI ROFL: New weight loss plan: drink crappy wine.
Fine as North Dakota wine: sensory expectations and the intake of companion foods.
“Taste expectations can influence taste evaluations. It is not known, however, whether the environmental cues that influence taste expectations–such as suggestible names and brand labels–can have a referred impact on the intake volume of companion foods. Adult diners who ordered a prix-fixe restaurant meal were given a complimentary glass of wine that had been relabeled to induce either favorable (“new from California”) or unfavorable (“new from North Dakota”) taste expectations. An analysis of plate waste indicated that those who believed they had been drinking California wine ate 12% more of their meal than those who instead believed they drank North Dakota wine. In combination with a sensory-based lab study, these results show that environmental cues–such as label-induced sensory expectations–can have a far-reaching impact on the food intake of companion foods.”
Photo: flickr/@joefoodie
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March 02 2011
NCBI ROFL: Smelly Week: How to train your mouse to be a wine snob.
It’s smelly week on NCBI ROFL! All week long we’ll feature the funniest papers about the science of stink. Enjoy!
Performance of mice in discrimination of liquor odors: behavioral evidence for olfactory attention.
“We examined performance of mice in discrimination of liquor odors by Y-maze behavioral assays. Thirsty mice were initially trained to choose the odor of a red wine in the Y-maze. After successful training (>70% concordance for each trained mouse), the individual mice were able to discriminate the learned red wine from other liquors, including white wine, rosé wine, sake, and plum liqueur. However, when the mice were tested to distinguish fine differences between 2 brands of red wine, their performance significantly varied among the individual trained mice. Among 10 mice tested, 2 mice were able to discriminate between the red wines (>75% concordance) whereas 6 mice failed to distinguish between them (50-67% concordance, where chance could be assumed to be 50%). More importantly, 2 other mice exhibited lower than 30% concordance, indicating that they were more attracted to the nonrewarded red wine compared with the learned one. This result suggested that the individual mice directed attention to different ...
February 25 2011
NCBI ROFL: Scientific study gives green light to drinking before GREs!
The effects of binge drinking on college students’ next-day academic test-taking performance and mood state.
“AIM: To assess the effects of binge drinking on students’ next-day academic test-taking performance. DESIGN: A placebo-controlled cross-over design with randomly assigned order of conditions. Participants were randomized to either alcoholic beverage [mean = 0.12 g% breath alcohol concentration (BrAC)] or placebo on the first night and then received the other beverage a week later. The next day, participants were assessed on test-taking, neurocognitive performance and mood state. PARTICIPANTS: A total of 196 college students (>or=21 years) recruited from greater Boston. SETTING: The trial was conducted at the General Clinical Research Center at the Boston Medical Center. MEASUREMENTS: The Graduate Record Examinations(c) (GREs) and a quiz on a lecture presented the previous day measured test-taking performance; the Neurobehavioral Evaluation System (NES3) and the Psychomotor Vigilance Test (PVT) measured neurocognitive performance; and the Profile of Mood States (POMS) measured mood. FINDINGS: Test-taking performance was not affected on the morning after alcohol administration, but mood state and attention/reaction-time were affected. CONCLUSION: Drinking to a level of 0.12 g% BrAC does not affect next-day test-taking performance, but does affect some ...
February 05 2011
NCBI ROFL: Superbowl Special: Sports fans who tailgate are more likely to get drunk.
Can We Assess Blood Alcohol Levels of Attendees Leaving Professional Sporting Events?
“Background: We measured blood alcohol content (BAC) levels of attendees at professional sporting events and assessed the factors associated with higher BACs. Methods: We conducted BAC tests of 362 adult attendees following 13 baseball games and three football games. We ran multivariate analyses to obtain factors associated with the risk of having a higher BAC. Results: In this assessment, 40% of the participants had a positive BAC, ranging from 0.005 to 0.217. Those who reported tailgating before the event had 14 times the odds of having a BAC > 0.08 and those under age 35 had nearly 8 times the odds of having a BAC > 0.08 (both compared to a zero BAC). Attendees of Monday night football games were more likely to have positive BACs compared to attendees at all other games. Conclusions: We found that it is feasible to assess BAC levels of attendees at professional sporting events. Our findings suggest that a significant number of attendees at professional sporting events may have elevated BAC levels, particularly young adults and those who participated in tailgating activities. Further research ...
January 19 2011
NCBI ROFL: Absolut memory distortions: alcohol placebos influence the misinformation effect.
“Can the simple suggestion that you have consumed alcohol affect your memory for an event? Alcohol placebos affect social behaviors but not nonsocial ones, and have not previously been shown to affect memory. We investigated the effect of alcohol placebos using materials that revealed both the social and the nonsocial influences of memory. Subjects drank plain tonic water, but half were told it was a vodka and tonic; then all subjects took part in an eyewitness memory experiment. Subjects who were told they drank alcohol were more swayed by misleading postevent information than were those who were told they drank tonic water, and were also more confident about the accuracy of their responses. Our results show that the mere suggestion of alcohol consumption may make subjects more susceptible to misleading information and inappropriately confident. These results also provide additional confirmation that eyewitness memory is influenced by both nonsocial and social factors.”
Photo: flickr/fabian.vervelde
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January 06 2011
NCBI ROFL: Want to make your Africanized honey bees more aggressive? Get ‘em drunk!
It’s insect week on NCBI ROFL! All week long we’ll be featuring the funniest scientific papers about our favorite creepy crawlies. Enjoy!
Development of an ethanol model using social insects: IV. Influence of ethanol on the aggression of Africanized honey bees (Apis mellifera L.).
“Experiments were designed to determine whether ethanol influenced aggression in honey bees. Two experiments are reported. In Exp. 1, harnessed honey bees were fed a 1%, 5%, 10%, or 20% ethanol solution. Two control groups received either a sucrose solution only or no pretreatment, respectively. The dependent variable was the number of sting extensions over 10 min. Analysis showed that aggression in harnessed bees was not influenced by prior ethanol consumption. Because there was some suspicion that the extension of the sting apparatus may be hindered by harnessing, and the authors wanted to use a design that increased ecological validity, Exp. 2 was conducted with free-flying bees. Sucrose or 20% ethanol solutions were placed in front of beehives, and the number of stings on a leather patch dangled in front of the hive served as the dependent variable. The experiment was terminated after 5 hr. because bees exposed ...
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