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Flypub To Study Ethanol Induced Behavioral Disinhibition and Sensitization
Published on: May 18, 2020
Effects of alcohol on disinhibition towards alcohol-related cues
Sally Adams1, Alia F Ataya, Angela S Attwood
1School of Experimental Psychology, University of Bristol, 12a Priory Road, Bristol BS8 1TU, UK. sally.adams@bristol.ac.uk
Background:
We investigated (1) the effects of acute alcohol on inhibition of alcohol-related versus neutral cues, (2) the effects of drinking status on inhibition of alcohol-related versus neutral cues, and (3) the similarity of any effects of alcohol or drinking status across two different cue types (lexical versus pictorial).
Methods:
Participants received 0.0 g/kg, 0.4 g/kg or 0.6g/kg of alcohol in a between-subjects design. Healthy, heavy and light social alcohol users (n=96) completed both lexical and pictorial cue versions of an alcohol-shifting task. Participants were instructed to respond to target stimuli by pressing the spacebar, but to ignore distracter stimuli. Errors towards distracter stimuli were analysed using a series of mixed-model ANOVAs, with between-subjects factors of challenge and drinking status and within-subjects factors of distracter type (alcohol, neutral) and block (shift, non-shift).
Results:
Lexical commission error data indicated a main effect of distracter (F [1,90]=43.25, p<0.001, η(2)=0.33), which was qualified by a marginal interaction with challenge condition (F [2,90]=2.77, p=0.068, η(2)=0.06). Following an acute high dose of alcohol participants made more errors towards alcohol distracters. Pictorial commission error data indicated a significant main effect of distracter (F [1,90]=67.40, p<0.001, η(2)=0.43), such that all participants made more errors towards neutral image distracters versus alcohol distracter images.
Conclusions:
Our results reveal acute alcohol's impairment of inhibitory control may be enhanced when a response towards alcohol-related lexical stimuli is required to be withheld.
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