According to a new study, alcohol does not impair a man's ability to tell whether a girl is legal or not. The study, published by the University of Leicester in the British Journal of Psychology, found that alcohol had very little impact on men's perception of the ages of women in pictures.
A total of 240 members of the public in bars and cafés were asked to look at composite photographs of ten young women aged 17 and asked to rate their attractiveness.
Some of the photos were digitally altered to give the faces a younger or older appearance and make-up was applied in some cases. Half of the participants questioned had consumed at least some alcohol before the task and their blood-alcohol level was measured by a breathalyser test.
The study found that participants consistently overestimated the age of the girls in the images by an average of 3.5 years. But although men and women rated younger-looking faces as more attractive on average, “contrary to expectations, alcohol and make-up did not inflate attractiveness ratings”, the researchers write.
The lead researcher, Vincent Egan, said: “This study suggests that alcohol consumption and make-up use do not interfere with how old we perceive someone to be.
“Another interesting finding was that, overall, participants who drank alcohol actually rated all the women in the photos as less attractive, compared with the participants who had not drunk alcohol.
“This seemingly flies in the face of the commonly held notion of ‘beer goggles’.”
So stop blaming your perverted (or preverted, as Scanner Colleen would say) ways on the beer, old men, and just admit you like little girls, okay?
[Telegraph: Men may not be able to blame alcohol for underage sex]
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