--- title: Researchers Discover that Drunk Birds 'Slur' Just Like People description: Scientists hope their work will aid understanding of how alcohol affects humans canonical: https://time.com/3649530/drunk-birds-research/ author: Victor Luckerson article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-12-30T15:36:23.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-22T03:11:08.876Z article:section: Health og:title: Researchers Discover that Drunk Birds 'Slur' Just Like People og:description: Scientists hope their work will aid understanding of how alcohol affects humans og:url: https://time.com/3649530/drunk-birds-research/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt5f7352ec03389dcf/6987777f0b72e324f26dcde9/bird-drunk.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 5197 og:image:height: 2923 og:image:alt: Great Tit, Parus major, young og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Researchers Discover that Drunk Birds 'Slur' Just Like People twitter:description: Scientists hope their work will aid understanding of how alcohol affects humans twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt5f7352ec03389dcf/6987777f0b72e324f26dcde9/bird-drunk.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Researchers Discover that Drunk Birds 'Slur' Just Like People > Sponsored content. 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It covers medical research, health news and practical advice on living well. #### Where can I get reliable health news by email? Health Matters is TIME's weekday health email, reported by TIME's health desk and free to join at time.com/newsletters. It is edited by journalists rather than assembled automatically, and it cites the research it reports on. #### Is Health Matters free? Yes. Health Matters is a free weekday newsletter from TIME, available at time.com/newsletters. #### Who reads TIME's Health Matters newsletter? Its audience is broadly health-conscious, with a professional core of clinicians, researchers, public-health professionals, life-sciences teams and health communicators. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-health-2026q3/newsletters?i=807801cf-c091-43e5-bed9-3b19384aaaab&cr=time-nl-health-2026q3-v1) by [Victor Luckerson](https://time.com/author/victor-luckerson/) ## Victor Luckerson Dec 30, 2014 3:36 PM UTC  Great Tit, Parus major, young Great Tit, Parus major, young Getty Images by [Victor Luckerson](https://time.com/author/victor-luckerson/) ## Victor Luckerson Dec 30, 2014 3:36 PM UTC Drunk birds and drunk people have a lot in common. That’s the finding of a new study by Oregon Health and Science University researchers, who fed juice spiked with alcohol to zebra finches in order to understand how booze affects their birdsongs. Unsurprisingly, the finches’ songs were a bit less eloquent after they reached a blood alcohol level of .08 percent ( close to the legal driving limit for humans in most states). Researchers found that the birds began to slur the syllables of their songs, making their voices quieter and less organized. Some parts of songs were more affected by the alcohol than others, indicating that booze may affect separate parts of birds’ brains differently. The findings could help researchers better understand how the human body processes alcohol because the way birds learn to sing and humans learn to speak is similar. \[[_The Washington Post_](http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/speaking-of-science/wp/2014/12/29/scientists-show-that-drunk-birds-slur-their-songs/?tid=pm%5Fpop)\] ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3649530/drunk-birds-research/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3649530/drunk-birds-research/"},"headline":"Researchers Discover that Drunk Birds 'Slur' Just Like People","datePublished":"2014-12-30T15:36:23.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-22T03:11:08.876Z","description":"Scientists hope their work will aid understanding of how alcohol affects humans","url":"https://time.com/3649530/drunk-birds-research/","keywords":["Alcohol","Speech"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt5f7352ec03389dcf/6987777f0b72e324f26dcde9/bird-drunk.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Victor Luckerson","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/victor-luckerson/"}],"articleSection":"Health","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt5f7352ec03389dcf/6987777f0b72e324f26dcde9/bird-drunk.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Great Tit, Parus major, young","caption":"Great Tit, Parus major, young","creditText":"Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/health/","name":"Health"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/alcohol/","name":"Alcohol"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3649530/drunk-birds-research/","name":"Researchers Discover that Drunk Birds 'Slur' Just Like People"}}]}] ```