--Original published at Gracie's Blog
Myth Busters: “Do Beer Goggles Really Exist?”
I chose to watch one of the short clips of “Myth Busters”. The short clip I watched was testing the myth that drunk people tend to find others more attractive than when sober. To go able this test, Adam, Kari, and Jamie all went through headshots of people and rated them one to ten on how attractive they were. The computer then totaled the score of each person. The next time they rated headshots of different people after they drank some beer. Adam’s score went up by 25, Kari’s score went down by 65, and Jamie’s score went down by 11. The group thought they should try it again but this time after they drank scotch. The third time they rated headshots Adam’s score went up by 13, Kari’s score went up by 63, and Jamie’s score went up by 6. The group came to the conclusion that when drunk people find others more attractive than when they are sober.
During this experiment I think that a strength was that they all three participated and rated people while sober, buzzed, and drunk. Adam and Jamie are males and Kari is a female which helped the diversity of the experiment. After each trial each result was slightly different, but overall they came to a conclusion that when drunk people find others more attractive. I also think a strength during this experiment was they were originally going to stop after drinking regular alcoholic beverages, but to actually get a full representation of rating people’s attractiveness while drunk they drank scotch also. Their scores were all different after the third trial, which helped clarify that Adam’s results were at a steady incline and Kari and Jamie’s results were a little up and down.
Some issues I had when watching this clip was the large range of numbers that they had to rate each person. The numbers were one to ten so if I were to rate a person’s headshot a five, and I saw the same person later I may rate them a six next time because to me a five and six are too close. If the scale was one to five that would help clarify how attractive the headshot is because there are less numbers to pick from. Another weakness was Adam, Kari, and Jamie had different headshots to look at for each trial. If they had to rate the same headshots each time, they could compare what they rated each person for each trial. Since everyone was different Kari could have received a lower score because the people she was given for the second trial were overall less attractive than the headshots in the first trial.
Overall, this short clip of “Myth Busters” was very interesting and gave me some insight on whether or not someone who is drunk finds people more attractive than they would when sober. The Myth Buster team went about this experiment very well and I like how they all participated in the experiment to receive ultimate results.