How to Recognize Signs of Intoxication

My primary function as a certified alcohol awareness trainer is to teach servers and sellers of alcohol to recognize signs of intoxication, and then to confidently intervene in situations where someone has indeed consumed too much alcohol, and now is a potential danger to themselves or others. I believe that the recognition portion of the program that I teach, The TIPS Alcohol Awareness program, is valuable information for anyone that consumes alcohol, or perhaps hosts home get togethers where alcohol might be present, or even to monitor whether their children may be experimenting with alcohol.

Recognition of the over consumption of alcohol starts with something the TIPS program refers to as "Behavioral Cues", which are the best visual way to recognize signs of intoxication. The visual Behavioral Cues also represent the logical progressive effects of alcohol as they present themselves.

The goal is to teach you how to size up anyone in your presence that is consuming alcohol as to what level of intoxication they may be at, or are approaching by using these cues. By doing this visually, this will help you to decide if as the host or hostess of a function, whether or not you will serve or allow them to consume any more alcohol.

The first two Behavioral Cues are considered mental cues, Inhibitions and Judgment. When people drink, they tend to become more talkative and friendly, which represents a lowering of their personal Inhibitions of how far they typically allow themselves to go in a social setting when not consuming alcohol. Then, as they consume more alcohol this leads to the shedding of further inhibitions and a loss of Judgment, which can and does lead to socially unacceptable behavior such inappropriate dancing or singing, getting too friendly with someone of the opposite sex, or even the telling of off color jokes that someone may not appreciate. People showing signs of poor judgment also have tendency to overrate themselves from a control standpoint and will think that they are ok to drive,when clearly they should not get behind the wheel of a motor vehicle.