Sunday, April 15, 2012

Experiment Shows Men Are Smarter When Drinking Beer

Drink enough beer and your judgement will soon be impaired. However, consume just enough and you could find yourself smarter.

That's the result of a recent study that was published at the University of Illinois in Chicago which claims drinking a few beers have positive effects on one's creative thinking.

Researchers conducted a word association quiz to participant volunteers. Half of them drank two pints of beer while the other half remained alcohol free.

The result? Those who had their alcohol fix answered the questions much faster (at 12 seconds per question) and more accurately than those that remained sober, who averaged 15.5 seconds per question.


Psychologist Jennifer Wiley has an explanation for the results and it's not really related to anything in beer, but more in the state of one's mind after consuming alcohol. She says, "We found at 0.07 blood alcohol, people were worse at working memory tasks, but they were better at creative problem-solving tasks."

"We have this assumption, that being able to focus on one part of a problem or having a lot of expertise is better for problem solving," she continued. "But that’s not necessarily true. Innovation may happen when people are not so focused. Sometimes it’s good to be distracted."

via TGDaily
Advertisement: