Alcohol Myopia
In an alternative explanation of alcohol's contribution to disinhibition, Steele and colleagues emphasize the importance of alcohol's physiological effects (Steele and Southwick 1985; Steele and Josephs 1990).
Their theory is based on evidence that alcohol impairs attention, cognition, and information processing. It proposes that a person is more likely to exhibit a socially "excessive" behavior when intoxicated, if the behavior ordinarily is one that presents a conflict. By decreasing the person's ability to process information, alcohol eliminates the conflict the person would experience related to the behavior. This is referred to as alcohol myopia, and, supposedly, greater intoxication leads to greater myopia which leads to greater disinhibition. A clear advantage of this alcohol-myopia explanation is that it extends to situations involving higher dosages of alcohol--the most problematic episodes of alcohol-related disinhibition involve high dosages.
Combining the alcohol-myopia model with the excuse explanation may yield a more satisfying account of sexual disinhibition following drinking. It is conceivable that when alcohol is consumed in low dosages, a person exploits the alcohol excuse to lead to sexual disinhibition. When alcohol is consumed in higher dosages (although not so high as to suppress sexual arousal completely), alcohol myopia becomes alcohol's main contribution to sexual disinhibition.
Conclusions
Alcohol and sexuality are closely linked in this culture. A casual description of this link is that alcohol has powerful aphrodisiac properties that can be used wittingly or unwittingly to encourage the reluctant mate or to unleash deviant sexual desires. Studies have revealed that the relationship between alcohol and sexuality is very complex. Alcohol can influence the expression of deviant and nondeviant sexual behavior; however, this influence is shaped by numerous qualifying conditions, such as dosage, gender, and expectancy.
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ETC. ETC. edited: Nark