Hanger Games
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Update 5/11/2017: Since the publishing of this comic, new research has emerged that puts the contents of the comic, and that of many other widely accepted psychological phenomena into question. You can read more about this “replication crisis” and the psychologists working to solve it here.

comic
©Maki Naro

In another edition of Science States the Obvious, an article published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences this week gives us the full scoop:** Hungry people are cranky as hell. **

In a paper titled, Low glucose relates to greater aggression in married couples, author Brad Bushman and his team at Ohio State University got down to the bottom of the phenomenon known as “being hangry” by testing the aggressiveness and irritability of 107 married couples over the course of 21 days using voodoo dolls and loud noises. I sense an IgNobel in this man’s future. Their results showed what we’ve come to expect all along: Subjects with lower evening blood glucose levels had stuck more pins into their voodoo dolls and were more aggressive in doling out punishments while playing the video game.

While the real study may not have ended in a fiery holocaust, the voodoo doll thing totally happened. I mean, there was a photo of it and everything (see below). Stay tuned tomorrow for another comic and the science behind why hanger occurs. Hopefully you can stop it before it’s too late.

voodoo doll
You tell me that’s not supposed to be Eddie Vedder Photo by Jo McCulty, Ohio State University