Virtual reality cues for binge drinking in college students

We investigated the ability of virtual reality (VR) cue exposure to trigger a desire for alcohol among binge-drinking students. Fifteen binge-drinking college students and eight students who were nonbingers were immersed into a neutral-cue environment or room (underwater scenes), followed by four alcohol-cue rooms (bar, party, kitchen, argument), followed by a repeat of the neutral room. The virtual rooms were computer generated via head-mounted visual displays with associated auditory and olfactory stimuli. In each room, participants reported their subjective cravings for alcohol, the amount of attention given to the sight and smell of alcohol, and how much they were thinking of drinking. A 2 x 6 (type of drinker by VR room) repeated measures ANOVA was conducted on the responses to each question. After alcohol exposure, binge drinkers reported significantly higher cravings for and thoughts of alcohol than nonbinge drinkers, whereas differences between the groups following the neutral rooms were not significant.