Abstract
Introduction Imagery-based stress management therapies are effective at reducing alcohol use. To explore the therapeutic mechanism, the current study tested whether brief functional imagery training linked to personal negative affect drinking triggers would attenuate sensitivity to noise stress-induced alcohol seeking behaviour in a laboratory model. Methods Participants were UK-based hazardous student drinkers (N = 61, 80.3% women, aged 18–25) who reported drinking to cope with negative affect. Participants in the active intervention group (n = 31) were briefly trained to respond to personal negative drinking triggers by retrieving an adaptive strategy to mitigate negative affect, whereas participants in the control group (n = 30) received risk information about binge drinking at university. The relative value of alcohol was then measured by preference to view alcohol versus food pictures in two-alternative choice trials, before (baseline) and during noise stress induction. Results There was a significant two-way interaction (p < .04) where the control group increased their alcohol picture choice from baseline to the noise stress test (p < .001), whereas the active intervention group did not (p=.33), and the control group chose alcohol more frequently than the active group in the stress test (p=.03), but not at baseline (p=.16). Conclusions These findings indicate that imagery-based mood management can protect against the increase in the relative value of alcohol motivated by acute stress in hazardous negative affect drinkers, suggesting this mechanism could underpin the therapeutic effect of mood management on drinking outcomes.
Highlights
Imagery-based stress management therapies are effective at reducing alcohol use
Causal evidence for this claim comes from the finding that experimental negative affect induction reliably increases alcohol demand, i.e., willingness to spend money on alcohol [8], and increases preferential choice of alcohol over alternative reinforcers, indicating that negative affect raises the relative value of alcohol over other rewards in university students [9, 10]
Such effects are augmented in individuals who self-report drinking to cope (DTC) with negative affect suggesting that individual differences in sensitivity to negative affect priming of alcohol choice may be a core component of dependence [11]
Summary
Imagery-based stress management therapies are effective at reducing alcohol use. To explore the therapeutic mechanism, the current study tested whether brief functional imagery training linked to personal negative affect drinking triggers would attenuate sensitivity to noise stress-induced alcohol seeking behaviour in a laboratory model. E current study tested whether stress-induced alcohol seeking in a laboratory model would be attenuated by brief functional imagery training (FIT) in which hazardous DTC drinker were taught to respond to their personalised negative affect drinking triggers by imagining a positive future activity, compared to a control group that received risk information about binge drinking at university.
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