Question then is whether there’s any basis for the colloquialism. Again from Wiki:
I would suggest another possibility.
ISTM that serious beer drinkers are prone to drink massive amounts of fluid in a relatively short amount of time, as compared to others. This would naturally distend the stomach and abdomen for the short term at least. If this happens on a regular basis, I’m wondering if this distension might frequently become permanent, due to stretched skin or weakened abdominal walls or the like. This would account for the “beer belly” stereotype. In that case, there would not be a tendency to excess fat in the gut, which would account for the studies referenced above not finding any, but nonetheless the tendency for a protruding stomach would still exist.
I can’t see how a normal body would get stretched out of shape like that simply by fluid passing through. A few things would make me doubt this:
The water from all that beer continually and fairly quickly passes through the body; it doesn’t just accumulate and sit for hours. Check out the lines at bathrooms where they serve beer. Also most serious drinkers don’t tend to chug large amounts at one time (that’s more of a college stunt), but rather space out their drinks over several hours. They might have drank a gallon by the end of the evening, but at any given time over the previous 4-6 hours they only had a few beers-worth of fluid in their system. It takes the body hours to metabolize the alcohol, but the water component passes through much faster.
You don’t see this kind of distension in people who drink non-beer fluids at the same rate. Those who still follow the “drink 8 cups of water per day” advice don’t change body shape, even though they’re also taking in elevated amounts of fluid compared to a more typical person.
Also, you can see in pregnant women how their bodies return to pretty much normal after their babies are born; it takes something pretty substantial and semi-permanent to cause that kind of distension, and as soon as it’s gone the body returns (mostly) to the previous shape.
Most serious drinkers who manage to keep their lives running normally will have a regular time span when they do their drinking (say a few hours), and the rest of the day/night sees normal levels of fluid intake. I’d say there is just too little fluid coming an going to change the shape of a persons body.
I don’t think there’s any evidence that beer drinkers have a different body shape or configuration than non-beer drinkers. The Wiki article does not indicate there is. Get your horse first, then find a cart.
The comparison you’re making here is of people who drink twice as much liquid (“a gallon” vs “8 cups a day”) in about 1/4 of the time (“several hours” vs “per day”). There would obviously be a lot more concentrated pressure on the body in the first case.
I’m not sure how true that is, though it may depend on what you mean by mostly. But here too, you’re comparing what’s typically 5-6 months at a time a few instances in a lifetime to what for some people is a lifetime habit.
I think it’s the sitting with a beer more than drinking the beer. I don’t see fluid distention as a likely culprit for the reasons listed above. Maybe fluid and gasses temporarily contribute some to the overall look, though.
I suspect that this is the issue – a “beer belly” isn’t specific to drinking beer, so much as it is specific to being guys who regularly consume a lot of extra calories by knocking back several beers (or more) most nights, and don’t live a particularly active lifestyle.
The chart in this Washington Post story shows that the “top decile” for alcohol consumption (i.e., the 10% of Americans who are the heaviest drinkers) drink an average of 74 drinks a week (or, over 10 a day). The “ninth decile” (i.e., the next-heaviest-drinking 10%) are drinking an average of 15 drinks a week (or, over 2 a day).
I’m still trying to grasp how this mechanism would deposit the fat that ‘beer bellies’ are made of in a location that has no connection to the stomach or effect the part of the abdomen that’s not closest to the stomach.
One point I have seen suggested for beer belly fat distribution is the use of hops to flavour beer. Some beers having much more hop than others (and the current trend in craft beers for insane hop flavour really exemplifying the range.) The hop flavour components can act as pseudo-estrogens, and will cause more female fa distribution patterns to emerge in a male. Females don’t store fat within the abdomen, but preferentially store fat subcutaneously. (One assumes that this is because storing fat within the abdomen would compete for space with a developing foetus.) So men that ingest a lot of hops along with lots of excess energy, may develop fat deposits that are deposited in a more female pattern than male pattern. So, fat on the outside of the abdominal wall, and in breast tissue.
It isn’t a total answer. They don’t deposit fat on their rump, and indeed the classic beer belly includes spindly legs under the oversize gut. Maybe there are a range of fat deposition triggers, and the hops/pseudo-estrogens only trigger the belly/breast related ones. Perhaps mimicking pregnancy.
Like Kenobi said, it’s a matter of extra calories - regardless of dietary source - not getting burned off and accumulating on one’s abdomen. Beer happens to be a popular source of calories for a lot of guys. I don’t think there’s any scientific evidence out there to suggest that fat will distribute any differently based on the dietary source. This is determined genetically.
Most beers are loaded with carbs, so if you have 3 or 4 beers, you are having a ton of carbs. Many beer drinkers drink a lot in sports bars or at sporting events, etc. On top of all that is the food, which is very fattening in and of itself. Pizza and beer, or potato skins loaded with cheese and bacon bits, or pulled pork, or … the list goes on.
Excess calories are more likely stored as visceral adipose tissue (VAT) when they hit all at once as opposed to be delivered to the blood stream more slowly. Hence refined carbs and added sugars have more impact on VAT than does the same calorie load in whole grains, fruit, and protein.
Also excercise prefentially burns from VAT stores (rather than the less metabolically harmful subcutaneous adipose tissue (SAT).
Beer bellies likely occur not only secondary to the total calories but the Apis loaf of alcohol and sugars in the context of a sedentary lifestyle. The same calories in over out delivered in whole grains, fruit, protein, coupled with excercise, would be more likely stored in locations less harmful.
When I was in college, I developed a “beer belly”, but it wasn’t from beer: I don’t drink alcohol at all. It was because of my diet and metabolism: When I was a teenager, I had the stereotypical “hollow leg”, and could eat vast quantities without gaining weight. But my metabolism changed at the beginning of my freshman year, and my appetite changed at the end, at the same time that I was put into an environment of all-you-can-eat dining halls. Net result: 30 pounds.
Since your typical beer is equivalent to two slices of your typical bread, this stands to reason. There are a lot more people who down a six-pack in the course of an evening than eat twelve slices of bread. Bar fare just adds to the problem.
