Abstract

Katariina Warpenius: “I´ll have a pint!” An actor-assisted restaurant purchase experiment

An actor-assisted restaurant purchase experiment was conducted as a part of the Local Alcohol Policy project. The experiment was implemented on Friday and Saturday evenings at bars and night clubs in two cities (94 in total). In the experiment a male actor pretended to be clearly under the influence of alcohol and tried to buy a pint at the bar. The aim was to find out whether the bar staff followed the legislation prohibiting the sale of alcohol to customers who were clearly under the influence of alcohol.

Thirty per cent of the staff refused to sell. Breaches were most common at downtown night clubs and big suburban nightspots. The probability of a member of the bar staff selling to a person under the influence of alcohol was increased by the presence of doormen, a queue at the bar, the gender and age of the staff member (female and older staff members being more prone to refuse), a general intoxication among the restaurant customers, and the timing of the purchase experiment (refusals being more probable during the early evening).

The experiment suggest that instead of juridical norms, many bar staff members follow informal social rules in their action: intoxication is an acceptable part of the party culture. The purchase experiment showed that this type of actor assisted field study can produce systematic research results.

Keywords: restaurants, responsible beverage service, self--supervision, intoxication, social control of drinking, invisible theatre