Car accidents can happen for several different reasons, but one common reason is that people just did not see, or were not aware of what was in their visual field. They could have been so focused on something else that they failed to notice other salient objects in their visual field. This is called inattentional blindness. This takes a significant amount of cognitive ability, and there are things that can make it even harder. Alcohol can impair cognitive functioning immensely, so when alcohol and driving are combined, it can be quite dangerous. Clifasefi, Takarangi and Bergman (2006) wanted to know if people under the influence of alcohol, or people who believe they are under the influence of alcohol, are more or less likely to notice these unexpected objects. The researchers expected that they would find that participants that actually received alcohol, not considering if they were told they had alcohol or a placebo, would find it hard to focus their attention outside of the requested task. They also expected the participants that received the placebo to notice the unexpected object an equal number of times, regardless of if they were told they had alcohol or the placebo. To test their hypotheses the researchers used a 2x2 balanced placebo design. They randomly assigned 47 adult participants, aged 21 to 35, to one of four conditions: told alcohol/ got alcohol, told alcohol/ got placebo, told placebo/ got alcohol, or told placebo/ got placebo. All of the participants were screened and then placed into groups of four or less by gender and taken to the Behavioral Alcohol Research Lab, which is made to look like a cocktail lounge. One participant from each group chose an envelope that revealed the group’s drinking condition, however, the bartender secretly chose a different envelope that contained the group’s actual drinking condition. All of the drinks were