Integrating disinhibition and learning risk for alcohol use

Nutrition and Inflammatory Load

Chronic inflammation has been suggested to play an important role in metabolic diseases, such as atherothrombosis and type 2 diabetes. A lot of research has focused on the immunomodulatory effects of several nutrients, such as fatty acids, antioxidants, carbohydrates, specific amino acids, micronutrients, and alcohol, which play a crucial role in the maintenance of an "optimal" immune response. In addition, specific dietary patterns, such as the Mediterranean diet, are evolving as protective against cardiovascular disease, because of their anti-inflammatory properties. In this article, the existing data concerning the nutrients' pro- and anti-inflammatory properties are presented, as well as dietary patterns that could protect from chronic inflammation and its metabolic and atherothrombotic complications.

The role of drug use outcome expectancies in substance abuse risk: an interactional-transformational model

While a variety of risk factors for substance abuse have been identified, the psychological mechanisms underlying the transmission of risk is unclear based on studies using traditional risk-outcome research designs. The present paper identifies drug use outcome expectancies as a common etiological mechanism involved in substance abuse risk. Existing literature findings are reviewed and integrated according to an interactional-transformational (IT) model of developmental psychopathology. This model identifies the preliminary (mediating) and secondary (moderating) role of drug expectancies as important operations involved in the development of substance use patterns. Advantages of the IT model over traditional trait-based or environmental models are discussed, along with implications for intervention and future research.

Elementary school drinking: the role of temperament and learning

Drinking in elementary school, despite its low base rate, has been shown to predict alcohol use in middle school (Wilson, Battistich, Syme, & Boyce, 2002), which in turn predicts alcohol abuse or dependence in young adults (Guo, Collins, Hill, & Hawkins, 2000). The authors report 1 of the 1st examinations of the relationship between personality and psychosocial learning risk factors and drinking behavior among elementary school students. Fifth-grade students completed measures of disinhibition, positive and negative alcohol expectancies, and drinking. MIMIC modeling, tests of mediation, and tests of moderation were completed to test these relations. It was found that disinhibition and positive alcohol expectancies were each related to drinking in 5th graders. Disinhibition moderated the relation between positive alcohol expectancies and drinking in some cases. Mediation was not supported.

Deficient behavioral inhibition and anomalous selective attention in a community sample of adolescents with psychopathic traits and low-anxiety traits

Socialization is the important process by which individuals learn and then effectively apply the rules of appropriate societal behavior. Response modulation is a psychobiological process theorized to aid in socialization by allowing individuals to utilize contextual information to modify ongoing behavior appropriately. Using Hare's (1991) Psychopathy Checklist and the Welsh (1956) anxiety scale, researchers have identified a relatively specific form of a response modulation deficit in low-anxious, Caucasian psychopaths. Preliminary evidence suggests that the Antisocial Process Screening Device (APSD; Frick & Hare, 2001) may be used to identify children with a similar vulnerability. Using a representative community sample of 308 16-year-olds from the Child Development Project (Dodge, Bates, & Pettit, 1990), we tested and corroborated the hypotheses that participants with relatively low anxiety and high APSD scores would display poorer passive avoidance learning and less interference on a spatially separated, picture-word Stroop task than controls. Consistent with hypotheses, the expected group differences in picture-word Stroop interference were found with male and female participants, whereas predicted differences in passive avoidance were specific to male participants. To the extent that response modulation deficits contributing to poor socialization among psychopathic adult offenders also characterize a subgroup of adolescents with mild conduct problems, clarification of the developmental processes that moderate the expression of this vulnerability could inform early interventions.

Alcohol expectancies, conduct disorder and early-onset alcoholism: negative alcohol expectancies are associated with less drinking in non-impulsive versus impulsive subjects

AIMS

Research suggests that positive alcohol expectancies promote excessive alcohol use while negative alcohol expectancies discourage excessive alcohol use. Evidence suggests that disinhibitory characteristics, such as conduct disorder and impulsivity, are associated with a general neglect of long-term negative outcomes. This study assessed whether negative expectancies would be associated more strongly with lower levels of alcohol use for low- compared with high-impulsive individuals.

DESIGN

Positive and negative alcohol expectancies, alcohol use and impulsivity were assessed in a sample of 99 young adults with alcohol dependence (AD) and conduct disorder (CD), 77 with AD and no CD and 124 controls.

FINDINGS

AD/CD subjects had higher proximal (same day) and distal (next day) negative alcohol expectancies, even though they drank more alcohol, compared with AD-alone and control subjects. Distal negative expectancies were associated more strongly with lower levels of drinking for low-impulsive compared with high-impulsive subjects. Proximal negative expectancies were associated more strongly with higher alcohol consumption for high- versus low-impulsive subjects.

CONCLUSIONS

Impulsivity and conduct disorder may be important factors in determining how much distal negative alcohol expectancies may discourage excessive alcohol consumption.

Alcohol expectancies in relation to personality and aggression among juvenile delinquents in Northern Russia

The relationships between alcohol expectancies, level of alcohol use, alcohol-related problems, aggression, and personality factors in 198 Russian male juvenile delinquents were assessed. A clustering procedure was used in order to establish main patterns of alcohol expectancies, yielding three major clusters. Level of alcohol use, alcohol-related problems, aggression, and personality factors were compared across the identified clusters. It was established that juvenile delinquents with a high level of positive alcohol expectancies and aggression represented a risk-group for higher involvement in drinking behavior as well as problem drinking, which in turn are related to specific personality traits. Implications of these findings for alcohol prevention among the youth are discussed.

Expectancy influences the operation of personality on behavior

The authors investigated the moderating effect of expectancies on personality for 2 different addictive behavior processes: (a) drinking and (b) binge eating and purging characteristic of bulimia nervosa. Study 1 found that positive expectancies for social facilitation from drinking moderated the effect of extraversion on drinking behavior among undergraduate men and women. Study 2 found that the expectancy that eating will help manage negative affect moderated the effect of trait urgency on bulimic symptoms among undergraduate women. Thus, the relationships of the trait risk factors to these 2 addictive behaviors are stronger if one also holds certain expectancies for reinforcement from those behaviors.