What kind of drunk are you?

Icarus
Sun, 26 Jul 2020 23:20:00 +0000

In the research article, "Searching for Mr. Hyde: A five-factor approach to characterizing
'types of drunks'", scientists identified four types of clusters:

Cluster 1 - "Hemingway"

the largest and included those who reported only slightly changing when intoxicated. Specifically, members of this group reported decreasing less in Conscientiousness (e.g. being prepared, organized, prompt) and Intellect (e.g. understanding abstract ideas, being imaginative) than the rest of the sample. Notably, two previous studies have found that, on average, these two factors reportedly decrease the most with intoxication (Winograd et al., 2012, 2014), so the moderate decreases demonstrated by this group make its members stand out as being ‘‘less affected’’ than drinkers in some of the other groups, much like the author Ernest Hemingway, who claimed that he could "drink hells any amount of whiskey without getting drunk".

Cluster 2 - "Mary Poppins"

composed of a small number of drinkers (approximately 14% of the sample) who are particularly Agreeable when sober (i.e. embodying traits of friendliness), and decrease less than average in Conscientiousness, Intellect, and Agreeableness when intoxicated. Accordingly, members of this cluster reported experiencing fewer overall alcohol consequences than those in the Mr. Hyde cluster (described next). The Mary Poppins group of drinkers essentially captures the sweet, responsible drinkers who experience fewer alcohol-related problems compared to those most affected.

Cluster 3 - "Mr. Hyde"

defined by larger than average intoxication-related decreases in Conscientiousness, Intellect and Agreeableness. In other words, members of this group, much like the dark-sided Mr.Hyde, reported a tendency of being particularly less responsible, less intellectual, and more hostile when under the influence of alcohol than they are when they are sober, as well as relative to members of the other groups. In the significant model associating overall negative consequences with cluster membership, the Mr. Hyde cluster drove the association. This was the only cluster that was statistically more likely to experience alcohol consequences, suggesting that individuals in this group not only embody less savoury personality characteristics when drunk, but also incur acute harm from their drinking (e.g. experiencing a memory blackout; beenarrested because of drunken behaviour; see Hurlurt & Sher,1992, for a full list of YAAPST items)

Cluster 4 - "The Nutty Professor"

tended to be particularly introverted when sober but demonstrated a large increase in Extraversion and decrease in Conscientiousness when drunk, relative to their sober levels
of these traits. They also tended to report having the most overall discrepancy between their reported sober and drunk FFM traits, as indicated by the lowest ICC of the four clusters (0.05). Surprisingly, membership in this cluster was not associated with experiencing more alcohol-related consequences within the past year. So, although the personality change displayed by ‘‘The Nutty Professors’’ may be the most dramatic, this does not appear to be associated with elevated harm – at least in terms of the alcohol-related consequences assessed in this study.

Although I don't drink, when I used to I would be the most extroverted person in the room (or gaming lobby). I distinctly remember making friends with everyone that I encountered online and in-person. Cue the next morning when I have to cull all the new contacts I received because I knew I would never talk to those people again unless I was drinking. So I guess I am a nutty professor since I am always the most introverted person in the room sober. This was an interesting study, and I think it is interesting to note the individual differences of people when inebriated, and what causes those individual differences.

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