London - It’s a go-to excuse for drunken decisions that seem less sensible in the cold light of day.
But "beer goggles" are not just a myth – and a study found it only takes a drink or two to lower our standards when chatting someone up.
Researchers at Edge Hill University, in Ormskirk near Liverpool, asked 127 students in bars – some sober and some drunk – to work on a computer as they were shown images of faces.
The study, in Psychology of Addictive Behaviours, found sober students were more distracted by attractive faces. But, Dr Rebecca Monk added, those who’d drunk were "equally distracted" by less attractive ones.
"Most people have heard of the 'beer goggles' effect, and our research adds to the body of evidence showing that there is some truth to this anecdotal wisdom," said co-author of the study Professor Derek Heim at Edge Hill University.
Then there's also a 2002 study that found consuming a moderate amount of alcohol will make you think people are 25 percent more attractive than they really are.
In the study from the University of St. Andrews, researchers took 80 college students and had half of them consume an alcoholic beverage and the other half remain sober.
They then showed the students photos of 120 men and women and asked them to rate the attractiveness of the photos on a scale from one (highly unattractive) to seven (highly attractive).
The drunk group gave each photo a 25 percent higher rating than the sober group - an indication that alcohol truly did have an affect on perceived attractiveness.
Hence the term beer googles.