Be careful out there.

Nearly everybody has a story about a drink spiking incident, whether it be themselves or someone they know, and the reality is it is happening far more often than you would think. Only a few days ago we ran the story of the group of women who foiled a man's attempt to drug a woman on a date in a California restaurant.

This story is all kinds of amazing https://t.co/6qH3XlMlhj

— Her.ie (@Herdotie) May 29, 2016

A new study published in the journal Psychology of Violence shows the frightening extent of the problem. It surveyed 6,000 students from three different American colleges and found that the patterns of drink-spiking aren't what you may expect. 462 students have said that they are sure that their drinks had been spiked with Xanax, roofies or other sedatives. That's a massive 8% of respondents who claim to have had their drink tampered with on a night out. Shockingly, 83% of respondents actually admitted to spiking someone else's drink, with the number one reason cited as 'fun'. Fun. Ok. That's a normal way of thinking. The second most cited reason for spiking someone was to commit a sexual assault. In terms of the locations where the drugging took place, almost 38% of them happened at house parties. Very disturbing stuff.