Alcohol-related Attentional Bias Research Articles

Supplemental Material for Are Alcohol-Related Attentional Biases and Holistic Perception Independent Processes?

Supplemental Material for Are Alcohol-Related Attentional Biases and Holistic Perception Independent Processes?

Craving modulates attentional bias towards alcohol in severe alcohol use disorder: An eye-tracking study.

Competing models disagree on three theoretical questions regarding alcohol-related attentional bias (AB), a key process in severe alcohol use disorder (SAUD): (1) is AB more of a trait (fixed, associated with alcohol use severity) or state (fluid, associated with momentary craving states) characteristic of SAUD; (2) does AB purely reflect the over-activation of the reflexive/reward system or is it also influenced by the activity of the reflective/control system and (3) does AB rely upon early or later processing stages? We addressed these issues by investigating the time-course of AB and its modulation by subjective craving and cognitive load in SAUD. A free-viewing eye-tracking task, presenting pictures of alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages, combined with a concurrent cognitive task with three difficulty levels. A laboratory setting in the detoxification units of three Belgian hospitals. We included 30 patients with SAUD self-reporting craving at testing time, 30 patients with SAUD reporting a total absence of craving and 30 controls matched on sex and age. All participants from SAUD groupsmet the DSM-5 criteria for SAUD. We assessed AB through early and late eye-tracking indices. We evaluated the modulation of AB by craving (comparison between patients with/without craving) and cognitive load (variation of AB with the difficulty level of the concurrent task). Dwell time measure indicated that SAUDpatients with craving allocated more attention towards alcohol-related stimuli than patients without craving (P < 0.001, d = 1.093), resulting in opposite approach/avoidance AB according to craving presence/absence. SAUD patients without craving showed a stronger avoidance AB than controls (P = 0.003, d = 0.806). AB did not vary according to cognitive load (P = 0.962, η2 p = 0.004). The direction of alcohol-related attentional bias (approach/avoidance) appears to be determined by patients' subjective craving at testing time and does not function as a stable trait of severe alcohol use disorder. Alcohol-related attentional bias appears to rely on later/controlled attentional stages but is not modulated by the saturation of the reflective/control system.

Tell me how you feel, I will tell you what you look at: Impact of mood and craving on alcohol attentional bias in binge drinking.

Alcohol-related attentional bias (AB) is thought to play a key role in the emergence and maintenance of excessive alcohol use. Recent models suggest that AB, classically considered as a permanent feature in alcohol use disorders, is rather modulated by temporary motivational states. We explored the influence of current mood and craving on AB in binge drinking, through a mood induction procedure combined with eye-tracking measures of AB. In Experiment 1, we measured AB (visual probe task with eye-tracking measures) among binge drinkers (n = 48) and light drinkers (n = 32) following positive, negative and neutral mood inductions. Participants reported subjective craving and mood before/after induction. In Experiment 2, we measured AB among the same binge drinkers compared with 29 moderate drinkers following alcohol-related negative, non-alcohol-related negative and neutral mood inductions. In Experiment 1, induced negative mood and group positively predicted subjective craving, which was positively associated with AB. We found no effect of induced positive mood nor a direct mood-AB association. In Experiment 2, the relationships AB presented with both induced negative mood and group were again mediated by craving. Inducing alcohol-related negative mood did not modify the mood-craving association. Alcohol-related AB is not a stable binge drinking characteristic but rather varies according to transient motivational (i.e., craving) and emotional (i.e., negative mood) states. This study provides important insights to better understand AB in subclinical populations and emphasizes the importance of considering motivational and affective states as intercorrelated, to offer multiple ways to reduce excessive alcohol use.

When Alcohol Adverts Catch the Eye: A Psychometrically Reliable Dual-Probe Measure of Attentional Bias.

Existing tasks assessing substance-related attentional biases are characterized by low internal consistency and test–retest reliability. This study aimed to assess the psychometric properties of a novel dual-probe task to measure alcohol-related attentional bias. Undergraduate students were recruited in June 2019 (N = 63; final N = 57; mean age = 20.88, SD = 2.63, 67% females). In the dual-probe task, participants were presented with simultaneous visual streams of adverts promoting either alcoholic or non-alcoholic drinks, and probes were presented in both streams. The dual-probe task measured the percentage of accurately identified probes that appeared on alcohol adverts in relation to total accuracy. The dual-probe task displayed excellent split-half reliability (M = 0.90, SD = 0.11; α = 0.90; 95% CI [0.84, 0.93]), and the derived attentional bias measure was significantly positively associated with beer drinking in a taste-test (r (57) = 0.33, p = 0.013; 95% CI [0.07, 0.54]), with habitual drinking (r (57) = 0.27, p = 0.045; 95% CI [0.01, 0.49]), and with increased craving (r (57) = 0.29, p = 0.031; 95% CI [0.03, 0.51]). Thus, the dual-probe task assessed attentional bias with excellent internal consistency and was associated with laboratory and habitual drinking measures, demonstrating initial support for the task’s utility in addiction research.

Alcohol-related attentional biases in recently detoxified inpatients with severe alcohol use disorder: an eye-tracking approach

BackgroundDominant theoretical models consider that attentional biases (AB) towards alcohol-related stimuli play a key role in the development and maintenance of alcohol use disorder (AUD). Their assessment has however showed high inconsistencies and has been mostly based on unreliable behavioral measures. This study evaluated the presence and extent of alcohol-related AB in recently detoxified inpatients with severe AUD by combining the visual probe task (VPT) paradigm with eye-tracking measures, known to improve the VPT reliability in subclinical populations. MethodsWe recruited 24 patients and 27 matched healthy controls. They performed the VPT (measuring reaction time when processing visual targets preceded by alcoholic and matched non-alcoholic pictures) combined with eye-tracking measures (dwell time, first fixation direction/duration, second fixation direction) during two sessions. Estimates of internal consistency, split-half reliability, and test-retest reliability were measured. ResultsPatients showed shorter dwell time for alcohol cues (p = .004, d=.853) and reduced number of fixations towards alcohol after a first fixation on non-alcohol cues (p = .012, d=.758) compared to controls. These findings suggest the presence of alcohol-related avoidance AB in detoxified patients with severe AUD. The VPT achieved excellent reliability for these eye-tracking measures. Reaction times and first fixation measures did not indicate any AB pattern and showed poor reliability. ConclusionsThe VPT, when combined with dwell time and second fixation direction, constitutes a reliable method for assessing AB in detoxified patients. It showed the presence of an alcohol-related avoidance bias in this clinical population, in contradiction with the approach bias predicted by theoretical models.

Raising the bar: improving methodological rigour in cognitive alcohol research.

A range of experimental paradigms claim to measure the cognitive processes underpinning alcohol use, suggesting that heightened attentional bias, greater approach tendencies and reduced cue-specific inhibitory control are important drivers of consumption. This paper identifies methodological shortcomings within this broad domain of research and exemplifies them in studies focused specifically on alcohol-related attentional bias. We highlight five main methodological issues: (i) the use of inappropriately matched control stimuli; (ii) opacity of stimulus selection and validation procedures; (iii) a credence in noisy measures; (iv) a reliance on unreliable tasks; and (v) variability in design and analysis. This is evidenced through a review of alcohol-related attentional bias (64 empirical articles, 68 tasks), which reveals the following: only 53% of tasks use appropriately matched control stimuli; as few as 38% report their stimulus selection and 19% their validation procedures; less than 28% used indices capable of disambiguating attentional processes; 22% assess reliability; and under 2% of studies were pre-registered. Well-matched and validated experimental stimuli, the development of reliable cognitive tasks and explicit assessment of their psychometric properties, and careful consideration of behavioural indices and their analysis will improve the methodological rigour of cognitive alcohol research. Open science principles can facilitate replication and reproducibility in alcohol research.

The effect of alcohol on food-related attentional bias, food reward and intake: Two experimental studies

Acute alcohol consumption has been shown to increase food intake, and long-term alcohol consumption may be a risk for weight gain. A potential, but under-studied, mechanism for this effect is alcohol's ability to enhance food reward. In two studies, participants consumed an alcoholic drink (Study 1: 0.3 grams of alcohol per kilogram of bodyweight (g/kg); Study 2: 0.6 g/kg) and a placebo-alcohol drink in a within-subjects design. In both studies, food-related appetitive and motivational states, and attentional bias (AB) towards food-related cues were measured. In Study 1 (N = 44), participants completed a visual probe task with concurrent recording of eye-movements which measured AB towards images of palatable foods, unpalatable foods, and non-food control items. Participants also completed measures of appetite and snack urge ratings, salivary response towards palatable foods and an ad libitum food taste test. In Study 2 (N = 84), participants completed a similar procedure, but completed a modified Stroop task which measured differences in food-related and alcohol-related AB across the two drink conditions. In Study 1, there was no difference in food-related AB between drink conditions, and no differences in snack urge, appetite ratings, salivary response, or food intake. In contrast, Study 2 showed an alcohol-induced increase in AB towards food, but not alcohol. Snack urge, alcohol urge ratings and ad libitum food intake were also higher after alcohol consumption, relative to the placebo. Collectively, these findings suggest that alcohol can increase food reward and food intake, but these effects may only occur at a higher dose.

Relationship Between Attention Bias and the Prognosis of Male Patients with Alcohol Dependence

<i>Background</i>: long term drinking in alcohol dependent patients seriously affects their physical and mental health. Abstinence treatment is very important, but there is no appropriate prediction method for the effect of abstinence in the past. <i>Objective</i>: In this study, we investigated word-cue attentional bias among male patients with alcohol dependence and its correlation with relapse after abstinence. <i>Methods</i>: Fifty male patients with alcohol dependence (ADs) and 50 male health controls (HCs) completed the Chinese version of the emotional Stroop task to assess attentional bias. The participants were evaluated at the beginning of the task using the Self-Rating Anxiety Scale (SAS) and Self-Rating Depression Scale (SDS). <i>Results</i>: The reaction times of ADs for neutral, negative, and alcohol-related words were significantly higher than those of HCs. The error index of ADs for neutral and negative words is worse than that of HCs. The period of maintained abstinence among ADs was positively correlated with the reaction time to negative words and the error index for negative and alcohol-related words. Linear regression showed the error index of alcohol-related words to be an import factor in terms of relapse. <i>Conclusion</i>: The number of errors in alcohol-related attentional bias cue words may be a predictor of the effect of abstinence.

The role of affect, emotion management, and attentional bias in young adult drinking: An experience sampling study.

Coping with negative affect is central to several prominent etiological models of alcohol use. These models posit that alcohol use becomes negatively reinforced due to its ability to alleviate negative affect. However, there have been mixed findings when testing this association at the event-level. The current experience sampling study sought to clarify this by testing if (1) within-person changes in the perceived difficulty of managing emotional distress is a significant predictor of alcohol consumption, over and above levels negative and positive affect and (2) whether acute changes in affective experiences give rise to increased attentional bias toward alcohol-related cues in the environment and if attentional bias mediates the association between difficulty managing emotions and alcohol consumption. Participants were 92 college students aged 18-25, who drink alcohol at least moderately. Participants completed 28days of experiencing sampling measures on their mood, difficulty managing emotions, alcohol-related attentional biases, and drinking. Findings showed that neither negative affect nor difficult managing emotions had significant effects on alcohol use. However, positive affect exhibited the expected associations with both attentional biases and drinking. State positive affect predicted acute increases in attentional biases and drinking, whereas trait positive affect was inversely associated with trait attentional biases and alcohol use. Alcohol-related attentional biases exhibited significant within-person variance; however, its relationship with drinking was only significant when the constructs were assessed concurrently at night and did not mediate the relationship between affect and alcohol use. Results highlight the importance of positive affect in this population.

Where's the wine? Heavy social drinkers show attentional bias towards alcohol in a visual conjunction search task.

Research indicates that high consumers of alcohol exhibit attentional bias (AB) towards alcohol-related cues, suggestive of a cognitive mechanism that might drive substance seeking. Many tasks that measure AB (e.g. visual probe, addiction Stroop), however, are limited by their reliance on non-appetitive control cues, the serial presentation of stimuli and their poor internal reliability. The current study employed a visual conjunction search (VCS) task capable of presenting multiple alcoholic and non-alcoholic appetitive cues simultaneously to assess whether social drinkers attend selectively to alcoholic stimuli. To assess the construct validity of this task, we examined whether alcohol consumption and related problems, subjective craving and drinking motives predict alcohol-specific AB. A VCS task was performed in a laboratory setting, which required participants to detect the presence of appetitive alcoholic (wine, beer) and non-alcoholic (cola, lemonade) targets within arrays of matching and non-matching distractors. Data from 99 participants were assessed [meanage =20.77, standard deviation (SD)=2.98; 64 (65%) females], with 81.8% meeting the threshold for harmful alcohol consumption (meanAUDIT =12.89, SD=5.79). Self-reports of alcohol consumption and related problems [Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT)], subjective craving (Alcohol Craving Questionnaire Short Form) and drinking motives (Drinking Motives Questionnaire Short Form) were obtained, and the VCS task measured response times for the correct detection of alcoholic and non-alcoholic targets. Participants were significantly quicker to detect alcoholic relative to non-alcoholic appetitive targets (P<0.001, dz =0.41), which was predicted positively by AUDIT scores (P=0.013, R2 =0.06%). The VCS task achieved excellent reliability (α>0.79), superior to other paradigms. The visual conjunction search task appears to be a highly reliable method for assessing alcohol-related attentional bias, and shows that heavy social drinkers prioritize alcoholic cues in their immediate environment.

Predictive cues and spatial attentional bias for alcohol: Manipulations of cue-outcome mapping

Previous studies suggest that cues predicting the outcome of attentional shifts provide a measure of anticipatory alcohol-related attentional bias that is correlated with risky drinking and has high reliability. However, this is complicated by potential contributions of visual features of cues to reliability, unrelated to their predictive value. Further, little is known of the sensitivity of the bias to variations in cue-outcome mapping manipulations, limiting our theoretical and methodological knowledge: Does the bias robustly follow varying cue-outcome mappings, or are there automatic cue-related associative processes involved? The current studies aimed to address these issues. Participants performed variations of the cued Visual Probe Task (cVPT) in which cues were non-predictive; in which there were multiple cue pairs, used simultaneously and serially; and in which the cue-outcome mapping was reversed. The major findings were, first, that previously found reliability cannot be attributed to aspects of the cues not related to outcome-prediction; second, that reliability of the bias does not survive deviations from a simple, consistent cue-outcome mapping; third, that all predictive versions of the task showed a bias towards alcohol; fourth, that the bias did not simply follow awareness of the cue-outcome mapping; and finally, that only in the case of simultaneous multiple cue pairs, an association with risky drinking was replicated. The results provide support for the reliability of the anticipatory attentional bias for alcohol, suggest that relatively persistent associative processes underlie the bias in the alcohol context, and provide a foundation for future work using the cVPT.

Beer? Over here! Examining attentional bias towards alcoholic and appetitive stimuli in a visual search eye-tracking task

RationaleExperimental tasks that demonstrate alcohol-related attentional bias typically expose participants to single-stimulus targets (e.g. addiction Stroop, visual probe, anti-saccade task), which may not correspond fully with real-world contexts where alcoholic and non-alcoholic cues simultaneously compete for attention. Moreover, alcoholic stimuli are rarely matched to other appetitive non-alcoholic stimuli.ObjectivesTo address these limitations by utilising a conjunction search eye-tracking task and matched stimuli to examine alcohol-related attentional bias.MethodsThirty social drinkers (Mage = 19.87, SD = 1.74) were asked to detect whether alcoholic (beer), non-alcoholic (water) or non-appetitive (detergent) targets were present or absent amongst a visual array of matching and non-matching distractors. Both behavioural response times and eye-movement dwell time were measured.ResultsSocial drinkers were significantly quicker to detect alcoholic and non-alcoholic appetitive targets relative to non-appetitive targets in an array of matching and mismatching distractors. Similarly, proportional dwell time was lower for both alcoholic and non-alcoholic appetitive distractors relative to non-appetitive distractors, suggesting that appetitive targets were relatively easier to detect.ConclusionsSocial drinkers may exhibit generalised attentional bias towards alcoholic and non-alcoholic appetitive cues. This adds to emergent research suggesting that the mechanisms driving these individual’s attention towards alcoholic cues might ‘spill over’ to other appetitive cues, possibly due to associative learning.

Alcohol-related attentional bias in a gaze contingency task: Comparing appetitive and non-appetitive cues

BackgroundNon-problem drinkers attend automatically to alcohol-related cues compared to non-alcohol related cues on tests of inhibitory control. Moreover, attentional bias for alcohol-related cues varies between problem and non-problem drinkers. AimTo examine attentional bias towards alcoholic and non-alcoholic appetitive cues between problem and non-problem drinkers. MethodForty-one university students (9 male, 32 female; Mage = 21.50) completed an eye-tracking gaze contingency paradigm, measuring the number of times participants looked at peripherally and centrally located stimuli (break frequency) when instructed to maintain focus on a target object. Stimuli consisted of appetitive alcohol-related (e.g., wine), appetitive non-alcohol-related (e.g., cola) and non-appetitive (e.g., fabric softener) stimuli. Participants were split using the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT) into non-problem (M AUDIT = 3.86) and problematic drinkers (M AUDIT = 11.59). ResultsProblematic drinkers had higher break frequencies towards peripheral appetitive stimuli than towards non-appetitive stimuli, while break frequency was equivalent between appetitive cues presented centrally (alcohol and non-alcohol-related). In contrast, there were no differences in break frequency across stimuli type or cue presentation location (central or peripheral) for non-problem drinkers. ConclusionIn contrast to non-problem drinkers, people displaying more problematic consumption practices may find it more difficult to inhibit eye movements towards appetitive stimuli, particularly when in peripheral vision. This may suggest that attentional biases, as measured in terms of overt eye movements, in problem drinkers may be most powerful when the alcoholic and appetitive stimuli are not directly in field of view. An uncertainty reduction process in the allocation of attention to appetitive cues may help explain the patterns of results observed.

Alcohol-related Attentional Bias Variability and Conflicting Automatic Associations

Attentional bias variability may be related to alcohol abuse. Of potential use for studying variability is the anticipatory attentional bias: Bias due to the locations of predictively-cued rather than already-presented stimuli. The hypothesis was tested that conflicting automatic associations are related to attentional bias variability. Further, relationships were explored between anticipatory biases and individual differences related to alcohol use. 74 social drinkers performed a cued Visual Probe Task and univalent Single-Target Implicit Associations Tasks. Questionnaires were completed on risky drinking, craving, and motivations to drink or refrain from drinking. Conflict was related to attentional bias variability at the 800 ms Cue-Stimulus Interval. Further, a bias related to craving and risky drinking was found at the 400 ms Cue-Stimulus Interval. Thus, the selection of attentional responses was biased by predicted locations of expected salient stimuli. The results support a role of conflicting associations in attentional bias variability.

Attentional blink to alcohol cues in binge drinkers versus non-binge drinkers

Previous studies have shown alcohol-related attentional biases in social drinkers; however, the temporal dynamics of these biases are not well understood. The current study examined this issue in 94 participants (27 male) categorized as binge drinkers (BD) or non-binge drinkers (NBD). Two versions of an alcohol-related attentional blink (AB) paradigm were used: one with words and one with images. It was predicted that BDs (versus NBDs) would exhibit reduced AB for alcohol cues, which would be enhanced for the pictorial version of the task (versus words). The relationships between AB and alcohol craving, quantity and frequency of alcohol consumption, symptoms of alcohol use disorder, and family history of alcohol use disorder (AUD) were also examined. While an AB was observed for both alcohol and non-alcohol targets in the NBD group, no AB was found for alcohol targets in the BD group. Furthermore, the magnitude of the AB was related to drinking, such that higher self-reported hazardous drinking was associated with smaller ABs to alcohol-related targets. However, AB was not related to craving or family history of AUD. These results suggest that alcohol-related stimuli are processed more efficiently by BDs, especially those with hazardous alcohol consumption patterns. These results may inform treatment and prevention efforts targeting binge drinkers.

Mood & alcohol-related attentional biases: New considerations for gender differences and reliability of the visual-probe task

IntroductionAlcohol-related attentional biases are positively associated with drinking history and may represent a mechanism by which alcohol use behavior is maintained over time. This study was designed to address two unresolved issues regarding alcohol-related attention biases. Specifically, this study tested whether acute changes in positive and negative mood increase attentional biases toward alcohol cues and whether coping and enhancement drinking motives moderate these effects. MethodsParticipants were 100 college students aged 18–25, who drank alcohol at least once in the last 90days. In a 2×3 mixed design, participants were randomized to one of three mood conditions (neutral, negative, or positive) and completed visual-probe tasks pre- and post-mood-induction. ResultsAttentional biases toward alcohol cues were significantly associated with alcohol consumption among men, but not women. Although the mood manipulation was highly successful, attentional biases did not vary as a function of mood condition and hypothesized moderating effects of drinking motives were not significant. ConclusionsThe largely null findings of the experiment are discussed in light of the fact that the visual probe task had poor reliability. Issues related to the reliability of visual-probe task are discussed, as more research is needed to evaluate and improve the psychometrics of this method.

Measuring inhibitory processes for alcohol-related attentional biases: Introducing a novel attentional bias measure

IntroductionAttentional biases for alcohol related information (AB) have often been reported for heavy drinkers. These attentional biases have been found to have predictive value regarding relapse in abstaining alcoholics. Similarly impaired inhibitory processes have also been found to be associated with heavy drinkers. This paper describes a new experimental paradigm that can be utilised to investigate attentional bias towards alcohol-related visual stimuli, specifically the ability to inhibit the orientation of initial and sustained attention, towards peripherally appearing stimuli. In this way we hope to study a novel aspect of attentional biases and how they relate to substance abuse. MethodsWe used a novel eye-tracking task which aims to measure inhibitory processes for AB. The experiment utilised a gaze contingency paradigm to measure the compulsion to process or attend to alcohol stimuli. 86 undergraduate participants were recruited (31 males; 55 females), aged 18–49years (m=20.88; sd=4.52). A ‘break frequency’ variable was computed for each participant. This was the number of times that participants tried to look at peripheral stimuli. We argue that this variable is a direct measure of how distracting peripheral stimuli were. ResultsIt was found that reported alcohol use was associated with the eye-tracking break frequency measure of inhibitory control. Thus, heavy drinking may be associated with decreased inhibitory control and increased attentional bias. ConclusionsResults suggest that attentional bias is not just a process of stimuli becoming prioritised, but also stimuli becoming compulsory to attend and process.

Longitudinal relations between cognitive bias and adolescent alcohol use

IntroductionTo prospectively predict the development of adolescent alcohol use with alcohol-related cognitive biases, and to predict the development of alcohol-related cognitive biases with aspects of impulsivity. MethodsData were used from a two-year, four-wave online sample of 378 Dutch young adolescents (mean age 14.9years, 64.8% female). With zero-inflated Poisson regression analysis we prospectively predicted weekly alcohol use using baseline cognitive biases. Additionally, multiple regression analyses were used to prospectively predict the emergence of alcohol-specific cognitive biases by baseline impulsivity and alcohol use. ResultsZero-inflated Poisson analyses demonstrated that the Visual Probe Task reliably predicted weekly alcohol use at different time points. Baseline alcohol use and baseline impulsivity measures did generally not predict alcohol-specific cognitive biases. ConclusionsThe findings of this study indicated that while certain measures of alcohol-related attentional bias predicted later alcohol use in young adolescents, approach biases did not. Baseline measures of impulsivity and alcohol use did not predict later alcohol-related cognitive biases. We discuss implications for cognitive models on the development of cognitive biases and their role in early addictive behaviors.

Reward sensitivity, attentional bias, and executive control in early adolescent alcohol use

This study examined whether attentional bias for alcohol stimuli was associated with alcohol use in young adolescents, and whether the frequently demonstrated relationship between reward sensitivity and adolescent alcohol use would be partly mediated by attentional bias for alcohol cues. In addition, this study investigated the potential moderating role of executive control (EC), and tested whether the relationship between alcohol-related attentional bias and alcohol use was especially present in young adolescents with weak EC. Participants were 86 adolescents (mean age=14.86), who completed a Visual Probe Task (VPT) as an index of attentional bias, a flanker-task based Attention Network Task (ANT) as an index of EC, the sensitivity of punishment and sensitivity of reward questionnaire (SPSRQ) as an index of reward sensitivity, and an alcohol use questionnaire. High reward sensitivity, high alcohol-related attentional bias, and weak EC were all related to alcohol use. The relationship between reward sensitivity and alcohol use was not mediated by alcohol-related attentional bias. As hypothesized, attentional bias was only associated with alcohol use in participants with weak EC. Together, the present findings are consistent with the view that high reward sensitivity and low EC may be considered as risk factors for adolescent alcohol use. The independent contribution of reward sensitivity and attentional bias might suggest that adolescents who are highly reward sensitive and display an attentional bias for alcohol cues are at even higher risk for excessive alcohol use and developing alcohol abuse problems. Future research using a longitudinal approach would allow an examination of these risk factors on subsequent alcohol use. Treatment implications are discussed, including the importance of strengthening EC and reducing the rewarding value of alcohol use.

Interference in the alcohol Stroop task with college student binge drinkers.

Heavy drinking among college students is associated with social, health, and legal problems. One factor that may contribute to heavy drinking is an attentional bias for alcohol-related cues, which can influence drinking automatically and without an individual's awareness. Using tests of alcohol-related attentional bias, such as the alcohol Stroop task, previous research has shown that alcohol dependent drinkers have greater attentional biases than non-dependent drinkers, but results for college student drinkers have been mixed. The present study examined alcohol Stroop task performance and its relationship to drinking levels and drinking-related problems among 84 college students during the 2009-2010 academic year with at least one binge drinking episode in the previous month. As hypothesized, results indicated that participants had greater attentional interference when alcohol words were presented compared to when neutral words were presented during the Stroop task, suggesting that the students in the sample displayed greater attentional biases for alcohol words compared to neutral words. Results showed that Stroop task responding did not vary by drinking frequency or drinking-related problems, but did vary by drinking intensity. Presentation of alcohol-related cues may cause heavier drinking college students to attend to these stimuli, which may increase the saliency of these cues and influence their likelihood of drinking. Implications for prevention and treatment efforts are discussed.