Drinkers consume beer more quickly from curved glasses, study finds

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/aug/31/drinkers-beer-quickly-curved-glass

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Drinkers consume beer almost twice as quickly if it is served in a fashionable curved glass rather than a conventional straight one, a study has reported.

It took on average nearly 12 minutes for those who took part to down 12 fl oz of lager (a little over half a pint or a third of a litre) from a straight glass. But from a curved glass it took seven minutes. There was hardly any difference if the alcohol was replaced with a soft drink.

The researchers suggest the reason may be that it is more difficult to accurately judge the halfway point of curved glasses. As a result, people are less able to gauge how much they have drunk.

They believe drinkers try to pace themselves and so the halfway point becomes important.

The experiment was carried out by academics from Bristol University's school of experimental psychology, who recruited 160 social drinkers aged 18-40 with no history of alcoholism.

While watching a tranquil nature documentary, they were invited to drink from either straight glasses or the sort of modern curved ones that have become popular in bars, clubs and some pubs. The rate at which the lager was consumed was markedly different depending on the type of glass they were using.

The people taking part were invited to a second session when they were shown various pictures of curved and straight glasses and asked to judge if they were more or less than half full.

It emerged that the participants who showed the greatest error in their judgment of where halfway was in the curved glasses tended to be those that drank the quickest from them.

The study highlights how in recent years makers of alcoholic drinks have invested in interesting branded glasses to differentiate their products.

These include chalice glasses, curved beer flutes, tankards and novel curved glasses.

Angela Attwood, who led the research, said: "People often talk of pacing themselves when drinking alcohol as a means of controlling levels of drunkenness, and I think the important point to take from our research is that the ability to pace effectively may be compromised when drinking from certain types of glasses."

The research, which was funded by a grant from Alcohol Research UK, is published in full in the online journal PLoS ONE.