Anxiety sensitivity dimensions and the alcohol hangover experience: Longitudinal associations with hangover-related...

Anxiety sensitivity (AS), the fear of anxiety-related sensations and emotions, is linked to alcohol use and related problems, yet its relationship to alcohol hangover experiences remains unstudied. Because hangover symptoms, like nausea and sweating, resemble anxiety-related sensations, we theorized that levels of AS would influence hangover-related experiences. We examined the relations of AS dimensions (i.e., AS physical, cognitive, and social concerns) with hangover-related experience outcomes (i.e., hangover-related anxiety and hangover-related depression). N = 334 emerging adult drinkers (aged 19-29) from three eastern Canadian universities who had experienced a hangover in the last two weeks completed self-report surveys at two time-points separated by one month. We hypothesized higher AS physical, cognitive, and social concerns at baseline would predict greater hangover-related anxiety at one-month follow-up, and only higher AS cognitive concerns at baseline would predict greater hangover-related depression at follow-up. We expected these results to hold while controlling baseline levels of the hangover outcome in question and other important covariates. Results revealed baseline AS cognitive concerns were the only AS dimension predicting hangover-related anxiety at follow-up beyond covariates. None of the baseline AS dimensions predicted hangover-related depression at follow-up beyond covariates. Results help us to identify who is at most risk of adverse hangover-related anxiety experiences and potentially prevent these aversive hangover experiences and associated future alcohol problems in hangover-sensitive drinkers by targeting higher AS cognitive concerns in intervention.