# Alcohol and behavior **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 2, 2010, 10:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alcohol-and-behavior/541620 "2010-06-02T10:49:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![John\_Stamos\_Left\_Ear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_stamos_left_ear/32/3198_2.png) [@John\_Stamos\_Left\_Ear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Stamos_Left_Ear)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2010, 10:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alcohol-and-behavior/541620/1 "2010-06-02T10:49:19Z")
Back in my waiting on tables days, my boss explained that he did not stock Jagermeister because people who drank it got into fights. I never got into whether his opinion was that particular types of alcohol influenced behavior or whether individuals prone to certain types of behavior were more likely to drink certain types of alcohol. There are lots of stereotypes about the latter but is there any research I to either? ---
**Author:** ![Lanzy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/74df32/32.png) [@Lanzy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lanzy)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2010, 12:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alcohol-and-behavior/541620/2 "2010-06-02T12:02:23Z")
There has to be studies somewhere. I read once that liquor drinkers are more prone to fights than beer drinkers…I think. But logic says booze is booze and a person that gets violent easy when drinking will get that way no matter what they drink. ---
**Author:** ![elbows](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b3f665/32.png) [@elbows](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elbows)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2010, 12:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alcohol-and-behavior/541620/3 "2010-06-02T12:05:44Z")
I live in a city dominated by a large university. Jagermeister was all the rage at first, then, one by one, bar owners stopped serving it, for the very reason you’ve described, it made people very combative. They are used to accommodating drunken students, no biggie, but this was too much for everyone. There are still a couple of places you can go if you really want it, but, largely, bar owners learned the hard way, to give it a pass. ---
**Author:** ![MeanOldLady](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/meanoldlady/32/10737_2.png) [@MeanOldLady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MeanOldLady)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2010, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alcohol-and-behavior/541620/4 "2010-06-02T13:22:07Z")
People have been peddling this claptrap for a long time. “Tequila makes you crazy”" and so on. It’s all ethanol. Are these people honestly contending there is some magic property of anise that makes people want to start brawls? It’s this: > [@John\_Stamos\_Left\_Ear](#): > > I never got into whether his opinion was that particular types of alcohol influenced behavior or whether individuals prone to certain types of behavior were more likely to drink certain types of alcohol. Jager attracts frat douches. Adults who like anise drink Fernet. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Stamos\_Left\_Ear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_stamos_left_ear/32/3198_2.png) [@John\_Stamos\_Left\_Ear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Stamos_Left_Ear)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2010, 1:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alcohol-and-behavior/541620/5 "2010-06-02T13:26:51Z")
> [@Lanzy](#): > > logic says booze is booze and a person that gets violent easy when drinking will get that way no matter what they drink. Well, there are reactions to wine that are fairly exclusive to that type of alcohol. And there is no shortage of individual people who all have an alcohol they will not take because it causes them something bad, whereas other alcohol is fine for them to consume. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2010, 1:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alcohol-and-behavior/541620/6 "2010-06-02T13:34:43Z")
My understanding is that studies show that alcohol has whatever effect on behavior the drinker believes it has. If the drinker believes that the drink will make him aggressive or violent, then it will. The implication is that the drinker is imbibing to have an excuse to behave aggressively or violently. ---
**Author:** ![Lanzy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/74df32/32.png) [@Lanzy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lanzy)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2010, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alcohol-and-behavior/541620/7 "2010-06-02T13:39:36Z")
> [@John\_Stamos\_Left\_Ear](#): > > Well, there are reactions to wine that are fairly exclusive to that type of alcohol. And there is no shortage of individual people who all have an alcohol they will not take because it causes them something bad, whereas other alcohol is fine for them to consume. I assume they are reacting to something in the wine besides the alcohol, there are a lot of ingredients in wine. Personally I never drink tequila, a couple of shots makes me puke so I avoid it, but I still say drunk is drunk. I am an affable drunk no matter what I drink. My brother starts fights no matter what he drinks, my wife goes to sleep no matter what she drinks. ---
**Author:** ![Wheelz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wheelz/32/5718_2.png) [@Wheelz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wheelz)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2010, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alcohol-and-behavior/541620/8 "2010-06-02T13:51:56Z")
I think there’s also the matter of ingesting a large amount of alcohol in a very short time. Even if the overall content is the same, it takes a lot longer to drink, say, six beers than to pound six shots of Jager. Going from zero to plastered in a matter of minutes surely has a more pronounced effect than slowly working up a buzz over a couple of hours. Though I can’t imagine Jager would be any better or worse than any other hard liquor. Maybe it’s just something people tend to overdo. ---
**Author:** ![MeanOldLady](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/meanoldlady/32/10737_2.png) [@MeanOldLady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MeanOldLady)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2010, 2:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alcohol-and-behavior/541620/9 "2010-06-02T14:06:36Z")
Jagermeister is 70 proof, which puts it in line with most hard liquor, which tends to hover around 80. Jager, however, is very sweet, so it’s easier for someone to overindulge on it than it would be on, say, Jim Beam. ---
**Author:** ![pilzner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f17d59/32.png) [@pilzner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pilzner)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2010, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alcohol-and-behavior/541620/10 "2010-06-02T14:10:48Z")
The New Yorker had an article on this a few months ago. If I remember right, the article featured someone who studied alcohol consumption across different cultures. Generally, behavior was at the whims of cultural and social expectations (including, for example, jaegar + tequila). From the summary: > [@](#): > > “Persons learn about drunkenness what their societies import to them, and comporting themselves in consonance with these understandings, they become living confirmations of their society’s teachings. Link - (subscription required) > **[Drinking Games](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/02/15/drinking-games)** > > How much people drink may matter less than how they drink it. > [@John\_Stamos\_Left\_Ear](#): > > And there is no shortage of individual people who all have an alcohol they will not take because it causes them something bad, whereas other alcohol is fine for them to consume. I think for most people its just negative reinforcement from a morning tied to the toilet. ---
**Author:** ![MikeS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/919ad9/32.png) [@MikeS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MikeS)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2010, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alcohol-and-behavior/541620/11 "2010-06-02T14:22:34Z")
> [@acsenray](#): > > My understanding is that studies show that alcohol has whatever effect on behavior the drinker believes it has. If the drinker believes that the drink will make him aggressive or violent, then it will. The implication is that the drinker is imbibing to have an excuse to behave aggressively or violently. This. Here’s an [interesting review of the cultural aspects of drunkenness](http://www.sirc.org/publik/drinking4.html). Money quote, drawn from another survey (bolding mine): > [@](#): > > There is overwhelming historical and cross-cultural evidence that people learn not only how to drink but how to be affected by drink through a process of socialisation… Numerous experiments conducted under strictly controlled conditions (double-blind, with placebos) on a wide range of subjects and in different cultures have demonstrated that **both mood and actions are affected far more by what people think they have drunk than by what they have actually drunk… In simple terms, this means that people who expect drinking to result in violence become aggressive;** those who expect it to make them feel sexy become amorous; those who view it as disinhibiting are demonstrative. ---
**Author:** ![Floater](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/dc4da7/32.png) [@Floater](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Floater)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2010, 2:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alcohol-and-behavior/541620/12 "2010-06-02T14:27:42Z")
I have read about such a study that showed that people from cultures without alcohol, and thus not knowing how they are expected to react, just get sleepy. ---
**Author:** ![Cheshire\_Human](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/5f8ce5/32.png) [@Cheshire\_Human](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheshire_Human)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2010, 2:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alcohol-and-behavior/541620/13 "2010-06-02T14:30:26Z")
> [@pilzner](#): > > I think for most people its just negative reinforcement from a morning tied to the toilet. That’s it for me and rum. Due to a night I will never remember, I can’t drink rum without yakking. However, it’s the taste and smell that does it, not the alcohol. If the taste is disguised in some kind of mixer, nothing happens different from vodka in the same mixer. ---
**Author:** ![Chessic\_Sense](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/7c8e57/32.png) [@Chessic\_Sense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chessic_Sense)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2010, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alcohol-and-behavior/541620/14 "2010-06-02T15:20:51Z")
I think there’s a clear reason why studies can’t show that the drink matters. The researchers always control for the amount of alcohol consumed. In real life, however, people that drink Jaeger are drinking more of it than someone that drinks, say, vodka. _Of course_ they get drunker and therefore into more fights-they drank more. I also wonder if it can be shown that certain types of alcohol absorb differently into the bloodstream. Perhaps if I have a stomach full of hamburger, vodka will get absorbed sooner than bourbon. Perhaps viscosity and temperature matter. Just some ideas.