"The girls [in photographs shown to bar patrons] were originally 17 years old and they were morphed to look like they were 15 up to 19. So from being girlish to being womanly," [forensic psychologist Vincent Egan] said.
"We found that alcohol basically didn't influence things as much as you might have thought. We found alcohol consumption did inflate attractiveness ratings but the greater alcohol consumption didn't lead to the overestimation of age."
He says there was no difference in age estimates between the drinkers and those abstaining.
"I thought I'd get more of a beer-goggles effect than we got but then the god of drunks is a very powerful person," Dr Egan said.
"You think how drunks do manage to walk home and they can give calm conversations. So perhaps alcohol doesn't always impair some sensory mechanisms but it may affect other kinds of mental processes."
Dr Egan says his research suggests men who have sex with underage girls should not be able to use alcohol as a defence.
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The "beer goggles" defense
"All the girls get prettier at closing time," we have long known. They also become more attractive when you are drunk, a recent UK study confirms. They do not, however, get older, according to the study, debunking the "beer goggles" defense to charges of sex with a minor. Nicole Butler has this story on the Australian B.C. site.
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