The study also revealed there was no difference in the beer goggle effect between men and women. 80 students at Glasgow University were shown colour photos of 120 male and female students from St Andrews University aged 18 to 26. Participants were asked to rate their aesthetic properties on a scale of one -highly unattractive - to seven - highly attractive. Half of the students had drunk up to 4 units of alcohol. The 40 ‘drinkers’ rated the people in the photographs as broadly more attractive than the non drinkers. Professor Barry Jones, from Glasgow University’s psychology department and Prof.Ben Jones, from St Andrews University, led the study. Prof Jones said: "we wanted to measure whether a moderate amount of alcohol increases the judgement of facial attractiveness.The increase in perceived attractiveness appeared to be the same for the ugly people as the pretty people. Attractiveness provides a very important signal of mate quality, it showsyou have good genes and a healthy body." The phenomenon is caused by alcohol stimulating the nucleus accumbens in the brain which determines facial attractiveness.Prof. Jones, whose previous studies have found moderate alcohol intake can increase the risk of having unprotected sex, presented his findings at the International Congress on Behavioural Medicine in Finland.