No, “America’s Hangover” isn’t a cute term for the seven-month-long sickness that’s befallen our nation since Trump took office. It’s the name of a report by Detox.net, which analyzed Instagram posts about hangovers and released a state of the union, if you will, on how folks across the country cope with a case of morning after ills.
When you’re hungover, do you share your woes on Instagram? I tend to withdraw socially — both in real life and online — until I can function enough to interact with others. But apparently plenty of folks do, at least, enough to warrant Detox’s study. The drug and alcohol treatment resource looked at ‘grams tagged #hungover, #hangover and #hairofthedog, and geotagged by city and state, to put together a report on hangovers in the U.S.
The study likely tells us more about social media behavior than it does drinking and day-after-drinking behaviors. But it’s a start. And the findings are more illuminating than you might think. Here’s what we learned:
“Beer” is the most common word used in Instagram posts about hangovers
Folks who posted with the hashtag #hangover most commonly referenced “beer” in their captions — 18,969 times, to be exact, beating out “cocktails,” “wine” and “vodka.” Does this mean beer is the more common culprit of hangovers? According to the Detox.net report, it’s more likely because beer is one of the more popular alcoholic beverage choices, prefered by 43 percent of alcohol-imbibing Americans, according to a 2016 Gallup poll.
Instagram users in Oregon post the most about hangovers
Oregon? Who’d a thunk the crunchy, PNW state would be packed with users hitting “post” while praying to the porcelain gods? Here’s a clue: Portland has the most breweries (91) of any city in the world. Hangover-related posts geotagged to Oregon were double those in New York, which came in second on the top five list, followed by Nevada, Massachusetts and Virginia.
And the state with the fewest? Mississippi, followed by Arkansas, South Dakota, Kansas and West Virginia. It’s hard to say why this might be, though a 2015 study published in the American Journal of Public Health reported lower rates of binge drinking in the South and Midwest, compared to other parts of the country.
Worldwide, New Yorkers post the most about hangovers
Instagram users in New York City post more about their hangovers than any other city in the world, with London, England as a close second. Sounds about right. At the bottom of the (whiskey) barrel is Brighton, England — no theories there.
People post about their hangovers most frequently on Sundays at 5 p.m. during the month of January
So much for Drynuary. Plenty of people out there are still going hard in the first month of the year. And Sunday at 5 p.m. makes sense as a common time to post: at the end of a weekend binge when your Sunday Scaries, coupled with the 5 o’clock blues, begin to creep in.
Monthwise, April and March were runners-up — spring fever? — and as far as days, Saturday had the second-most posts, followed by Mondays and Fridays.
The most common hangover cure is breakfast
Definitely didn’t need a study to tell me that. Posts with the hashtag #hangovercure most commonly included the words “breakfast,” followed by “brunch,” “yummy,” “bacon,” and “delicious.” Bunch of hungover, basic bitches in ‘Merica!
Find the full report here.
