Intoxication Tests

V

Vivi

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I was discussing intoxication and mindfulness on a Buddhism forum I recently joined, and another member mentioned intoxication tests. Knowing this forum has a lot of LEO types, I was wondering if anyone could suggest some tests I could have administered by a friend to judge impairment under the influence of alcohol and / or marijuana.

There are experiments one can perform while being videotaped as one takes in measured quantities of alcohol or other drugs which prove conclusively the effects these substances have on judgement and mental and physical abilities. I would suggest that you find these and try them out for yourself, with impartial persons administering the tests and recording your performance. You might be surprised at the results.
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I'm not sure where to find them; you might try Googling with different parameters such as "alcohol", "test", and "judgement" for them or something like that. I found out about them from a person who had worked at the local District Attorney's office, who had been exposed to them as part of DUI-awareness training. A DA or a police officer or someone took them to a bar, and they ran these exercises, then they all had one drink, and they ran them again, and so on, all the while videotaping for later review. The results were very clear.
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Thanks for the timely reply KV, however I was more interested in measuring physical and mental impairment rather than the blood levels of specific substances. Do you know of any resources for such a thing?
 
Vivi said:
I was discussing intoxication and mindfulness on a Buddhism forum I recently joined, and another member mentioned intoxication tests. Knowing this forum has a lot of LEO types, I was wondering if anyone could suggest some tests I could have administered by a friend to judge impairment under the influence of alcohol and / or marijuana.
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The standard field sobriety test has been around for a long time and to my best knowledge is still being used by law enforcement today. I won't go into it here at length but you should be able to google field sobriety test and come up with the specific coordination tests involved. One has to do with touching your hand to your nose with eyes closed and another has to do with walking heel to toe in a straight line. As with anything, the devil is in the details.
 
I saw two of my town's finest administering a field sobriety test at 8am this morning! One giving the test, the other as a witness. 8am!!!!:eek: She didn't look like she was going to pass either. Kinda cute though....
 
They are standardized and proven to detect impairment, but not necessarily intoxication impairment.

The four most common are the Finger To Nose, Heel To Toe, Rhomberg Balance and One Leg Stand. There's also HGN (horizontal gaze nystagmus).

--dan
 
dano said:
They are standardized and proven to detect impairment, but not necessarily intoxication impairment.

The four most common are the Finger To Nose, Heel To Toe, Rhomberg Balance and One Leg Stand. There's also HGN (horizontal gaze nystagmus).

--dan
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Correct! To determine that, you'd have to conduct some sort of bodily fluid or breath analysis for the presence of alcohol. The lack of alcohol detection would indicate the presence of some type of drug. Drug detection would require Urine or blood analysis (I guess these days any bodily fluid would do as long as the individual is a "secreter."
 
I have an easy test for marijuana. Seems to work quite well on some people I know.

Just...ust....ust talk...alk...alk like...ike...ike this...is...is. You are trying to create sort of an echo effect.

If he is obviously trying not to laugh, or if does laugh, or goes "Whoah...dude," chances are he's flying.
 
None of the standard field sobriety tests are considered scientifically valid since they have never been published in a peer reviewed scientific publication. None of them can really be considered concrete evidence of intoxication either. They are more of a tool to determine if it is likely that someone is impaired and further testing should be performed.

I used to hang out with a lot of cops, including the armorer of the local department, and they used to test all kinds of stuff on me. The nystagmus test seemed to be the one that worked the best and some of the guys were actually pretty good at estimating blood alcohol content just based on that test. The other tests seemed to be more affected by other factors than the nystagmus test.
 
There is a product called Alcoscan (digital display breath alcohol tester) and it accurately measures blood alcohol. All you have to do is blow into a hole (almost like talking into a cell phone and about the same size) and it gives you a digital read-out starting at 0.00, 0.01, 0.02, etc BAC (it also beeps). It is really accurate and you know if you've had to much to drink to drive. BTW it cost $60.
 
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