Pupil responses of addicts in treatment to drug culture argot: I. Auditory presentation of double entendre words

Abstract

Eleven addicts in treatment and eight nonaddicts familiar with addict argot were asked to listen to and think about a series of words, half of which were double entendre, having one of their meanings in the addict argot. Pupil size, the dependent variable, was recorded continuously via infrared cinematography. Both groups of Ss responded differentially to the two kinds of words. These results were interpreted in terms of the cognitive processing of the stimuli rather than their emotional impact.