# Sobriety Tests, how to do them/ spotting a drunk **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 21, 2008, 2:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sobriety-tests-how-to-do-them-spotting-a-drunk/442221 "2008-03-21T14:38:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Zebra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c0e974/32.png) [@Zebra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zebra)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2008, 2:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sobriety-tests-how-to-do-them-spotting-a-drunk/442221/1 "2008-03-21T14:38:30Z")
For reasons I don’t want to go into, I may need to preform a sobriety test on an adult male. Having only watched a few on COPS, and The Man with Two Brains, I still feel unprepared. So, how does one adminsiter a sobriety test? Besides the smell of booze on the breath, what are good clues that a person is intoxicated? ---
**Author:** ![Santo\_Rugger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e95f7d/32.png) [@Santo\_Rugger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Santo_Rugger)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2008, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sobriety-tests-how-to-do-them-spotting-a-drunk/442221/2 "2008-03-21T14:48:41Z")
[http://www.duiguy.info/FieldSobriety.html](http://www.duiguy.info/FieldSobriety.html) There’s a good starting point. We had a cop come to our high school and tell us the main things they look for. Failure to follow directions properly and starting things too soon are two main things that I remember. Two common examples of not following directions are spinning at the end of walking a line, instead of taking a bunch of small steps as instructed, or turning your head when asked to follow a pen. ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2008, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sobriety-tests-how-to-do-them-spotting-a-drunk/442221/3 "2008-03-21T15:02:20Z")
My brother was a police office and he says that following a straight object like a pen is the best test by far. You hold a pen straight up about 8 inches from their face and move it back and forth in a smooth and fairly slow motion. You instruct the person to follow the pen with their eyes and not turn their head at all. Intoxicated people usually have problems with keeping their head perfectly still during this test. ---
**Author:** ![Two\_and\_a\_Half\_Inches\_of\_Fun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ea666f/32.png) [@Two\_and\_a\_Half\_Inches\_of\_Fun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Two_and_a_Half_Inches_of_Fun)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2008, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sobriety-tests-how-to-do-them-spotting-a-drunk/442221/4 "2008-03-21T15:08:09Z")
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**Author:** ![Zebra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c0e974/32.png) [@Zebra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zebra)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2008, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sobriety-tests-how-to-do-them-spotting-a-drunk/442221/5 "2008-03-21T16:07:02Z")
Hopefully I only need to do this for a few more nights. OK, I am the stage manager for a show, and last night, one of my actors was drunk. So befor I let him go on tonight, and the remaining nights of the show, I need to know if he has been drinking and I’m not going to trust his replies to my questions. ---
**Author:** ![Uncommon\_Sense](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Uncommon\_Sense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uncommon_Sense)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2008, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sobriety-tests-how-to-do-them-spotting-a-drunk/442221/6 "2008-03-21T18:01:43Z")
[QUOTE=Zebra] Hopefully I only need to do this for a few more nights. OK, I am the stage manager for a show, and last night, one of my actors was drunk. So befor I let him go on tonight, and the remaining nights of the show, I need to know if he has been drinking and I’m not going to trust his replies to my questions. [/QUOTE] Saying the alphabet backwards always gets me. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![danceswithcats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9e8a1a/32.png) [@danceswithcats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/danceswithcats)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2008, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sobriety-tests-how-to-do-them-spotting-a-drunk/442221/7 "2008-03-21T18:15:13Z")
[QUOTE=Shagnasty] My brother was a police office and he says that following a straight object like a pen is the best test by far. You hold a pen straight up about 8 inches from their face and move it back and forth in a smooth and fairly slow motion. You instruct the person to follow the pen with their eyes and not turn their head at all. Intoxicated people usually have problems with keeping their head perfectly still during this test. [/QUOTE] Your brother is referencing [HGN or Horizontal Gaze Nystagmus](http://www.nhtsa.dot.gov/people/injury/enforce/nystagmus/hgntxt.html) testing. ---
**Author:** ![Soul](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Soul](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Soul)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2008, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sobriety-tests-how-to-do-them-spotting-a-drunk/442221/8 "2008-03-21T18:56:47Z")
Another vote for HGN testing here – the eyeball bounce is sort of fun to watch and very easy to spot. Make sure to try it out on a non-sober control first to see what it looks like without the alcohol marinating their eyeballs. Doing it again later on an intoxicated subject will generally yield pretty impressive (and interesting, to me anyway) results.