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Subscribe to RSSPeople with tattoos drink more than their tattoo-less peers, a new study from France suggests.
The researchers asked nearly 3,000 young men and women as they were exiting bars on a Saturday night if they would take a breathalyzer test. Of those who agreed to take it, the researchers found that people with tattoos had consumed more alcohol than those without tattoos, the researchers said.
Previous studies have shown that tattooed individuals are more likely to engage in risky behaviors, such as unprotected sex, theft, violence and alcohol consumption, compared to people without tattoos.
The researchers suggest educators, parents and physicians consider tattoos and piercings as potential "markers" of drinking, using them to begin a conversation about alcohol consumption and other risky behaviors.
However, doctors should not stereotype individuals with tattoos as heavy drinkers, the researchers cautioned.
Clinicians should spend time "talking to them about safe tattooing, etc., and alcohol in general … not because they have tattoos or piercings but because they are in a high-risk age group," Myrna Armstrong, Professor Emerita at the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center, who was not involved in the study, said in a statement.
Previous studies have also shown those with only one tattoo have similar alcohol consumption habits as those with no tattoos, while those with seven or more tattoos are more likely to fall into the "high risk" group, Armstrong said.
The study is published in the July issue of the journal Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research.
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This study is further evidence that people who have tattoos are somehow different personality -wise than people who don't have tattoos. Show me someone who has two or more tattoos and I will say that they are probably conflicted, immature, or at the least, self-absorbed. Tattooing is indicative of some type of personality variation to be sure. The more tattoos one has the more they are likely to be an extreme or conflicted or "different" personality.
My Uncle has an American flag on one arm and U.S.M.C. on the other arm.
Nuts, I know.
I'm not referring to military tattooing. Or prison, tattoos, necessarily. Serving in the military, and serving hard time in prison are two huge life experiences for men and women, and, traditionally, people from those two groups were the ones who got tattoos. And people understood why they had tattoos. Those were major life experiences, not passing hobbies or interests.
Since the 80's, more people have engaged in "recreational" tattooing----- tattooing tribal or psuedo-spiritual images on themselves as a means of defining themselves to others.
There is growing research about the links between people who are heavily tattooed and inappropriate behavior or mental illness.
Got it. Prison tattoos are ok. No link to mental illness there, I'm sure.
Do you believe your own babble?
I think you don't understand things.
No, I think you Jeff have pegged people with tattoos as "problem people". Yes it is an interesting and creative way of expressing ones self but most of these people are normal everyday friendly people. Did you ever think that maybe they take offense to people that think they are somehow inferior human beings because they have been "inked"?
I wonder if this chick has tattoos:
http://www.technolog.msnbc.msn.com/technology/technolog/woman-impregnated-motorhead-concert-seeks-father-craigslist-715264
http://www.craigslist.org/about/best/chi/2948959310.html (this is the original ad)
This is the biggest crock of @!$%#. My husband, who is a combat wounded Marine, has sleeves, but hardly drinks. I have tattoo's, but I'm not an alky in any way. Also, neither myself or my husband engage in 'risky behavior' and neither of us has had trouble with the law! Yet, a number of my friends who don't have even one tattoo, are raging alcoholics-- and they are in the air force, are teachers, hold governmental positions, etc., and some have DUI's but again, NO TATTOO'S. This study was just another huge waste of time and money. Why don't these morons concentrate on something VALID??? Why is MSNBC reporting garbage??
Jeff: Tattooing has been around for thousands of years and is a global experience. It's mostly a "western" thing to have a derogatory opinion of them.
Perhaps in general, people with tattoos are more likely to take risks. This may or may not be related to other risky behaviors. Or, they might just be creative.
I am 41, female, have several large (and expensive) tattoos, and I am not a drinker, or a smoker, or a drug user. In fact, I have a high IQ, am in Mensa, have a productive job, and am a mom. Stereotypes are made to be challenged.
I remember when I was a lot porter one summer, and a car rolled in with a Mensa bumper sticker. It was a sh*tty 20-year-old Corolla and smelled like ferret piss on the inside. (I know it was ferret piss due to the other bumper sticker saying something about ferrets.) Ever since then, Mensa has been totally discredited. You can have a high IQ but completely lack common sense e.g. don't let a ferret piss in your car.
There you go, I just challenged the stereotype that being a member of Mensa actually means something.
zupercram, were you commenting on this story?? Clearly, you are no Mensan.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/47067663/?__utma=154396583.1581231691.1333122413.1334616744.1334628203.124&__utmb=154396583.4.10.1334628203&__utmc=154396583&__utmx=-&__utmz=154396583.1334628203.124.6.utmcsr=msnbc.msn.com|utmccn=
Haha zupercram complete fail
I bet JeffH.-749372 also lives in a town where dancing has been outlawed.
Well @!$%#. I have 10 tattoos and don't drink. Period. I don't like it. My husband has zero tattoos and he still finds himself head in a toilet the morning after a boys night after all these years because he doesn't know when enough is enough is enough.
Oh yea, and I did my undergrad in biomolecular chemistry, have a masters in that as well, and have a JD. Tattoos aren't a sign of anything but someone wanting to get one. The end. If you'd like to draw the conclusion that there is a causal link between a carefree attitude and a higher incidence of tattoos and drinking, maybe--but to say someone with tats is a drunk? No.
Dysphoria is right. This study conflates correlation with causation. The common personality dimension leading to some tattooing, drinking, and other risk taking behavior is impulsivity. That is not to say that all persons with tattoos are impulsive (many tattoos are commemorative, military, or the subject of a long decision-making process), only that those with regrettable tramp-stamps or trashy flash pieces are likely the same ones that shirk work for a day of boozing or who won't stop after the first beer. For reference, see every season of Jersey Shore.
This is just another way for people to label another group as problems. Just like any group, you will have those that are useless. But to provide generalizations based on such a small sample size is sad.
I like my tattoos and will get more. I don't drink, do drugs, or half the junk the researchers say I should. I provide for my family, have a great job and several degrees.
statisticly jeff you are right on target. does not apply to the individual but as a subgroup of our population yes. tattoos are not a birthmark, they are a choice. a button down shirt is also a choice.
the tattoo says generally speaking: i am outside the norm
a button down shirt generally says: i am inside the norm
more outside the norm behaviors go with tattoos than with button down shirts.
sure people with button down shirts have tattoos, but when you look at the statistics they separate the groups pretty clearly.
factcheckero,
research says nothing about you. you are an individual and patterns are not established by looking at one individual.
research of this type talks about patterns in groups. i would have thought you'd learned that while getting your degrees.
This is absolutely the worst case of "observational analysis" that I've seen in a very long time. They collected data from people from people leaving bars and they generalized their findings to a minority fraction of that group. They only sampledpeople leaving bars. It says absolutely nothing about people with tattos who don't go to bars or were not at that bar that night. There is no possible way to say anything about people with tattoos. Period. You can only make a statement about people who go to bars.
I would think that "going to bars" would be much more of a "marker of drinking" than "having piercings, tattoos, etc." In fact, the correct analysis would be "fewer people with tattoos go to bars than people without tattoos" and make a case that not having a tattoo is correlated with alcoholism.
Folks, we have known for 3500 years that correlation does not equal causation. And this article supposes a causal link that is simply not there. This is why MD's should NOT be doing research. They simply do not have the training, skills, or criticial thinking abilities to pull the load. Instead you get this junk pseudo-science where correlation equals causation and cancer ios cured ten times a week. MD researchers have a consistent ability to look where the light is best, not where they lost their wallet.
yeah, if they checked the people who never LEFT the bars, it would have skewed the data even further. lol.
well, does that data say this? people with tattoos who go to bars drink more that people without tattoos who go to bars. this points the way for further research. trouble is you can't breathalize people who stay home. it ain't perfect, but you collect your data where you can get it.
Maridanne: I'm trying to follow your statement (criticism?), but I cannot make sense of it. Psychological research of course samples large populations and identifies patterns therein, the purpose being that the findings can then can be applied to predict individual behavior and explain possible causation if there are statistically significant results. Are you saying that this study shows that - within a large sample - people with tattoos tend to drink more, but that finding has zero applicability to any particular individual within that group? Really? Or were you responding to Chase?
nope. tattooed people in BARS tend to drink more. it points the way for additional research if you are interested in that.
basicly i said don't take it personally.
By that logic, nearly every psychological study should be limited statements about college undergrads instead of the population at large, since the samples usually consist of only undergraduate students looking for extra credit in their intro psych classes. I don't think you have any idea what you are talking about.
The only thing this "study" proves is that the researchers don't know how to conduct a proper study and that people who like to stereotype tattooed people will believe anything without questioning the data.
Most of the articles reporting on the study don't bother to post the actual data, which shows an insignificant increase in blood alcohol level between people with and without tattoos.
The number of men with tattoos in this study represented less than 10% of the total, and had a 0.01 higher blood alcohol level which is within the range of error of most breathalyzers. Do you notice that the number goes up as the sample size goes down? The group with both tattoos and piercings consisted of only 27 people. No rational person would attempt to draw a conclusion based on the findings of less than 2.5% of people involved in a study.
Drawing the conclusions they did from this terrible sampling of data is just absurd.
factcheckero: The problem with the study is that the results were not statistically significant. There were just not enough tattooed and/or pierced people studied, nor were the differences in blood alcohol significant enough to draw the conclusions they did.
I have 4 tattoos, 2 each on my upper arms. I don't drink or do drugs, and haven't be arrested for anything. Who did they poll 60's & 70's biker gangs? (I'm being sarcastic). Just because you have a tat (or tats) doesn't make you any different than people without them!
Maybe the theory of tattooed people drinking more is the other way around. Maybe heavy drinking leads to getting more tattoos, as in the drunken sailor waking up with a new tattoo that he can't remember getting.
It's just a fad. It's permanent, it's expensive, it carries risks, and it turns off some potential employers.
I wonder... if researchers stood outside a gym and measured the biceps of people with tattoos and those without.. Which group would they say was stronger.
this article is total BULL$H%T!!!! I know quite a few alcoholics that have zero tattoos an few heavily tattooed people that are light drinkers. why dont you find another group to stereotype.
This article and the study makes intuitive sense. I'd also bet that there's a chicken and egg relationship in that drunk people get more tattoos. Just a guess on my part, but there's a Jimmy Buffett song to that effect. Maybe we could call it the Buffett Corollary.
Of course not everybody who gets a tattoo is drunk and there are many meaningful and patriotic tattoos, but being drunk probably contributes a significant number of tattoos to the art scene.
most shops won't tattoo you if you're drunk...
Has it not occurred to anyone that they only looked at people coming out of bars????? Then they claimed that correlation really is causation even though Jeff Foxworthy's Fifth Grader would have known better. Then they generalized what pertained only to people coming out of a bar to all people. George W Bush would have known better!
It's like saying: "I went to an 'I am an idiot' convention and interviewed people coming out. I compared people who were physician-researchers to people who are not physician-researchers and determined that physician-researchers are dumber than other attendees. From this I conclude that all physician-researchers are dumb."
The statement might be true, but it is not arrived at rationally or scientifically.
I know my comments will upset the "dolphin and tribal band" crowd so here is just one link to read about tattooing and personality:
http://blogs.riverfronttimes.com/dailyrft/2010/01/new_study_heavily-tattooed_people_more_prone_to_deviant_behavior.php
That explains all those barb-wired and "sleeved", nuts I see at the gun show. I used to see normal people at the guns shows like hunters and target shooters. Now it's tattooed, survivalist, end-of-days morons.
Once again, I have 4 tats and I've never been arrested for anything. Another stupid article pulling conclusions together with information they probably got from an episode or 2 of COPS
i have nine tattoos and have never been arrested and have worked every since i left school this study is a complete crock!!!
This study is dumb. I don't drink and never have, and have never done any of those risky behaviours. I think MSNBC needs to learn what a real study is, and maybe not report on junk science.
This study and the one Jeff H. posted were very poorly done and I should know as I just my master's degree in Library and Information Science and my last class was literally how to design a proper research proposal. Polling less than 2000 students in 2 states and asking people to use a breathalyzer outside of bar is laziness on the researchers part and not a well rounded population correlation. Plus breathalyzers aren't always accurate, nor does it mean the tattooed person drank more, they just drank more later in the evening.
When I was in my 20's I would go out with non-tattooed friends and we would generally have the same amount of drinks depending on who was driving if we were indulging. Now in my 30's, my sisters who do not have tattoos are much more likely to have three glasses of wine to my one. I've never been arrested, ticketed for more than a minor traffic violation, not prone to violence and have never stolen anything. I currently have three tattoos and will be getting two more on my foot when I reach my weight goal.
Good for you!
Heath0888
Anything? Ever? Your whole life? I think we've established that you are a liar. I guess people with tattoos are liars.
he's stolen my heart
I have 8 tats (all small and almost all not visible), my husband 4 (2 large 2 small, none visible in uniform). He's a soldier, I'm an Army wife. We have 2 small children. We live a normal life with NO drinking. Neither of us have ever been in trouble with the law. Neither of us have been involved in risky behavior. I find this study flawed or my husband and I are just a rare exception to the rule!
No drinking at all? Ever? I don't even like drinking (headaches), and I'll drink every once and awhile like New Years, 4th of July etc. This is just further evidence of my newfound theory that people with tattoos are mythomaniacs!
supercram- get a life...
Reading the headline, I didn't bother reading the story, the word "DUH!" was my first thought...I'd be surprised if it wasn't most people's first thought.
"Previous studies have shown that tattooed individuals are more likely to engage in risky behaviors, such as unprotected sex, theft, violence and alcohol consumption, compared to people without tattoos." In other words, people that tend to make impulsive and immature decisions about their body in one area are likely to show the same lack of judgment in others. Unsurprising. I dated a woman with a well-done tattoo of a geisha covering her entire back and it was still an abomination to an otherwise beautiful woman. For one thing, with tats that extensive, you'll never be truly "nude" again and I think the human body looks best in its natural state. Plenty of others do also, including the thousands with tattoos who are making the tat-removal business one of our fastest growing industries. Tats are a fad; fads are for posers.
impulsive and immature? Tell that to the Pacific Islanders. By many it's considered art, and art is in the eye of the beholder. Just because you don't have an affinity of it, doesn't mean that your opinion is right. Just like Picasso is not for everyone.
My tattoo was anything but impulsive. I wanted one earlier in life, but everyone said to wait, that I would regret it when I got older. I wanted one in my 20s. I still wanted one in my 30s. I turned 40 and decided that since I still wanted one after 20 years, I was not being impulsive or immature. My 40th birthday present to myself was a beautiful tattoo that I designed myself (it has personal meaning) with the help of a friend's husband who owns his own tattoo parlor in England. He even told me what to look for in a reputable tattoo artist so I would choose wisely. Three years later, I still LOVE my tattoo and will eventually get a second one, although I won't just pick out something random for the sake of getting a tattoo. Again, I will put a lot of thought into it and make sure it has some personal significance.
1952 called--they want their genuinely moronic study back...there is no way that they tested all the single mama's with ink acknowledging their mamahood and offspring or all of the nerds/geeks with their superhero/comic book heroes inked, or the intellectuals with one liners from obscure writers...they tested rock star wannabes, military dudes, bikers, frat boys/sorority girls, bar flies, gangsters and their ilk and painted a biased picture...next study for these researchers wasting good money: televangelists and politicians tend to have more sex scandals, strippers often report daddy issues, mainstream idiots like to think that tattooed people are somehow different than them and thus, more dangerous..
"People with tattoos drink more than their tattoo-less peers, a new study from France suggests.
The researchers asked nearly 3,000 young men and women as they were exiting bars on a Saturday night if they would take a breathalyzer test."
The primary statement is completely negated by the next line. The proper opening statement should have been: People studied leaving a bar showed that bar patrons with tattoos consumed more alcohol than bar patrons without tattoos. Since the survey was completely voluntary, it's also possible that the more intoxicated non-tattooed patrons just refused the breathalyzer.
I did over 20 yrs in uncle sam confused group and i ride a motorcycle and i am proud to say i do not have one tattoo.
Why tattoo? Every idiot the cops are looking for has one.
what's there to be proud of-so you don't want a tattoo, big deal...
It is a common sense thing , you would not understand.
You really can't fix stupid even if some of them are doing research, LOL.
The only thing this study suggests is that there was a lot of people with tattoos in the French bars on that Saturday night and the young tattooed men and women may have been in the bars longer which would account for the higher alcohol content then the ones with out tattoos. I’m inked on my arms, shoulders and back and drink very little I have friends without any ink on them and they are heavy drinkers. I have other friends that got tattoos after years of heavy drinking. This research study is heavily flawed and was done on a Saturday night (a research study on ONE Saturday night)
I have tattoos and don't drink. My daughter has tattoos and doesn't drink. I think they should do a study that is not at a bar. And more than 3000 people. I love tattoos and am not a bit into risky behaviors.
This study must have been put together by first semester undergraduates. It's absolute garbage and all it does is bring out the judgmental garbage who somehow think they're superior because they don't have ink.
If I want your self-indulgent stereotyping useless opinion, I'll tattoo "give me your opinion on tattooing" on my middle finger that way when I ask you can save your breath.
I have a tattoo and I don't drink AT ALL!
I tend to agree with the majority of other posters on this one. This french study is trash. I don't have any tattoos and I drink, my neighbor has many tattoos and he doesn't drink any alcohol.
This just in...People who drink a lot tend to get tatoos!
Awesome...a *French* study that proves pussies don't get tattoos.
I drank more in school than now. Zero tats then three now. Study is flawed.
I would like to see a study on how many section eight housing residents have tattoos .
look, people do lots of crazy things in order to get attention.
some people get tatoo's.....
some people post on newsvine....
which one are YOU?!
http://spacecoast.backpage.com/FemaleEscorts/classifieds/EnlargeImage?oid=5967939&image=6276242
lots of tattoos . Real classy , huh?
Did it ever occur to these geniuses that maybe people who are coming out of a bar tend to drink more?
I really have to wonder how much a job writing these junk science articles actually pays.
I am a mom of 3, at 36 years old and have been married almost 11 years. I have a sleeve on my right arm, a large tattoo on my right shoulder blade, a labret piercing and my ears are stretched to a 00 size. In two weeks I'll be starting on my left sleeve. Does that make me a deviant? Yes. Does that make me a deviant who drinks and engages in risky behaviour? Does risky behaviour mean playing WoW, or dancing to Beach Boys with my 6 year old? Does risky behaviour mean rewatching Farscape with my husband on Netflix? Personally, I rarely drink. As in, maybe 3 or 4 times a year, and even then it's only one or two drinks and I'm done.
No, these were people who exited a bar. Of course they are drinking, of course if they are young men and women, they are probably in college or college age. It's widely accepted that drinking heavily is part of college. Any tattoo shop that I've been to WILL NOT tattoo you if you've been drinking. It's a CYA thing and the fact that alcohol will thin the blood and make you bleed more getting a tattoo.
Tattoos are getting to be more widely accepted and can my symbols of beauty (Suicide pin up girls anyone?). If tattoos are getting more widely accepted, then MORE people will have tattoos. That alone increases they chance that they will engage in risky behaviour simply from a statistics standpoint.