Make mine a double standard - Why blotto women are an embarrassment

Gender attitudes reflect the glass half full / half empty syndrome.

Drunk women are disgusting, embarrassing and slutty, while drunk men are merely amusing or "a joke", a new study exposing the double standard of New Zealanders' attitudes to drinking has found.

The Massey University study by psychologist Antonia Lyons found that although there was acceptance of drunkenness among women and men within their groups of friends, there was a double standard for strangers.

"Older women, attractive women and women who are out in public very drunk ... are condemned for their drinking," Dr Lyons wrote.

In her just-released study of 32 men and women, aged between 20 and 30, Dr Lyons said the subjects noted the double standard, with women's drinking being acceptable up to a point.

"Once very drunk, however, women are looked down upon, considered embarrassing and also 'slutty'."

One woman, Carla, quoted in the report, summed it up.

"It's a real double standard as well. Like, if there's a guy in a club that's really quite disgustingly drunk it's kind of a joke.

"But if there's a girl who's got like her makeup smeared all over her face and is falling over and can't walk in her high heels properly it's quite embarrassingly bad."

Dr Lyons said drinking excessively was traditionally a masculine behaviour, which people were used to, but not so for women.

She was surprised at her findings.

"In a way I was reassured that within their groups both women and men saw women going out and drinking with friends positively, as something that developed friendships and socialising, which is a real shift in terms of our culture," she said.

"But I was totally surprised by the negative stereotypes of other women's drinking out in public, which reinforces more traditional views on women as always being in control and caring for themselves and others."

Dr Lyons' study - Going out and getting pissed: Young adults, drinking and gender identity - is to be presented at the New Zealand Psychological Society and Australian Psychological Society joint annual conference in Auckland this month.

- NZPA