Bigger wine glasses make drinkers pour themselves more than they realise

Pouring wine while holding the glass in your hand can also make you underestimate your intake, research suggests

US researchers have found that people unwittingly pour themselves larger amounts of wine when drinking from larger glasses (Getty)

While many wine drinkers who suffer with a bad hangover the next day believe it is because they had one too many glasses, a study suggests it may be the size of their wine glass that caused them to unwittingly drink too much.

Researchers found that drinkers unwittingly gave themselves larger servings when they had wider glasses, held them in their hands while pouring or when the colour of the glass matched the winde, the Daily Express reports.

A team of scientists from Iowa State and Cornell Universities in the US recruited 73 students who drank at least one glass of wine a week.

The drinkers were offered glasses of different sizes but were each time told to pour the same amount of wine.

The test subjects gave themselves 11.9 percent more wine when they used a wider glass and drank 12.2 percent more if they held the glass while pouring.

Douglas Walker, one of the authors of the research published in the journal Substance Use and Misuse, said, “Participants were asked to pour the same amount at each setting, but they just couldn’t tell the difference.”