5 Things You Secretly Suspected (Confirmed By Science)

While that result may or may not have been co-authored by Jack Obvious, esteemed Captain of the No Shit Squad, another part of the study had the subjects play video blackjack. As it turns out, horniness-induced dumbassitude isn't exclusively directed toward sexual decisions. The porn-enforced group took a whole lot bolder (read: dumber) chances in the game than the control group. Moral of the story: Maybe don't gamble when you have a boner. Or do, if that's your kink. I'm not your dad, I can't tell you what to do.

The researchers at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia had a hypothesis that when a woman disrupts male hierarchy in some way, the poorer-performing males are the ones who suddenly start sweating sexism. In 2015, they studied this in the most potentially sexist environment known to humanity -- online FPS games -- and discovered that the guys who were shittier at the games were submissive toward "male-voiced" superior players, but liable to scream abuse the second they recognized the better gamer as a female.

This study was done to support a larger "evolutionary argument" that guys with comparatively low status and dominance are more hostile to women who potentially threaten their status in the social hierarchy. Luckily, at no point in history have these titans of diminished dignity started, say, any sexist harassment movements that specifically center around video games or anything. Oh, wait.

Science Says:

According to recent research courtesy of Michigan State University, your asshole boss will totally get what's coming to him, and it doesn't even require Sheryl-shaped dong bacteria or any other outside elements. Even better, although you might not notice it, this only takes about a week.

Unfortunately, before that happens, he might actually become stronger. Suppressing dickish behavior is mentally stressful for supervisors, so by giving in to his abusive impulses, a boss can receive a host of mental benefits and even replenish his energy, like some bullshit psychic vampire from an office-themed RPG. Unfortunately for him (but fortunately for sweet, sweet schadenfreude), that high turns sour in about a week. By that time, the many tiny ways his bullying and belittling have managed to poison the workplace atmosphere outweigh the benefits, and then start slowly chewing away at his mental well-being and ability to engage. This still probably doesn't stop him from acting like a fuckstick, but at least you can relish in the knowledge that he's slowly being hollowed out from the inside. Emotionally, that is. If you want a physical hollowing, the dong bacteria is still your best bet.

And hey, if that's not enough for you, I might know a guy about the bacteria thing.

Science Says:

Yeah, there's a link between flipping your shit over grammar and having negative character traits. In fact, it's accurate enough that you can even get a sense on what type of asshole your average Grammar Nazi is, based on the mistakes they prefer to focus on. Here, read this and discover what kind (if any) you are:

Hey! My name is Pat and I'm interested in sharing a house with other students who are serious abuot there schoolwork but who also know how to relax and have fun. I like to play tennis and love old school rap. If your someone who likes that kind of thing too, maybe we would mkae good housemates.

If your first instinct is that the only way you'd share a house with Pat is if said house is on fire and you get to chain them to a wall, then you're A) probably an introvert, as they're more sensitive to grammar and typos, and B) absolutely correct, because that message comes from research done by linguists at the University of Michigan, and it's specifically manufactured to infuriate people who care about grammar. Researchers made test subjects read emails from a "potential future housemate" with a deliberately unisex name, and then assess what kind of person this was. Their answers were cross-referenced with a Big Five personality test the subjects also took, and a pattern of assholery emerged. Less open and more conscientious people seem to be particularly sensitive to typos, while people are more likely to correct grammar the less agreeable their personality is.

Also, at least one Cracked columnist was driven to a nigh-homicidal rage when he discovered that the paper calls grammar errors fucking "grammos." Is ... is that a thing? Sounds like a Harmony Korine movie. Please, let's never make it a thing.

The thing is, there's always that sneaking suspicion: What if that drunk person -- that person who's way more likely to speak their mind than Sober You, way more extroverted and honest and experimental and horny and generally deviant than you'd normally ever dare to be -- is the real you? Am ... am I really the "touch my beard" guy, while the (mostly) sober person writing this column right now is just a pale imitation, shackled and restricted by the norms of society and pants? Say it ain't so, science!

Science Says:

As much as we'd all like to use the old "That was the booze, I'm not really like that at all" excuse for that one time when we drunk-dialed all our exes, compared our boss to a genital wart to his face, and woke up in a ditch beside a stolen police motorcycle, science disagrees. Alcohol doesn't make you do stupid stuff; it just dulls the brain's "alarm signal" which monitors your mistakes, allowing you to do all the stupid stuff you wanted to do anyway.

According to a 2011 "Let's get them drunk and scan the shit out of their brains as they do stupid drunk stuff" study at the University of Missouri, you're not behaving "unlike you" when you're drunk at all. You just care less about the consequences of saying and doing what you really think and want. This totally applies to our tendency to feel a little friskier after a few drinks, too. This paper, which looks into so much research in the alcohol/boning field that the source notes alone take up eight pages, heavily indicates that although alcohol has powerful aphrodisiac properties, we totally use them to, quote, "wittingly or unwittingly to encourage the reluctant mate or to unleash deviant sexual desires." Christ.

Yeah, you know what all of this means. That thing you did at that party? You know the one. That was you, unfiltered, undistilled, and unleashed. Yes, even the thing with the two clowns and the traffic cone. Especially the two clowns and the traffic cone. Sorry you had to hear it from me. No, don't apologize to me. Apologize to the cone.

Pauli Poisuo is a Cracked columnist and freelance editor. Here he is on Facebook and Twitter.

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