Factors underlying risk taking in heroin-dependent individuals: Feedback processing and environmental contingencies

To produce or not to produce? Contrasting the effect of substance abuse in social decision-making situations

Substance use disorders (SUD) have been related to high criminal justice costs, expensive healthcare, social impairment, and decision-making deficits. In non-social decision-making tasks, people with SUD tend to take more risks and choose small immediate rewards than controls. However, few studies have explored how people with SUD behave in social decision-making situations where the resources and profits depend directly on participants' real-time interaction, i.e., social foraging situations. To fulfill this gap, we developed a real-time interaction task to (a) compare the proportion of producers (individuals who tend to search for food sources) and scroungers (individuals who tend to steal or join previously discovered food sources) among participants with SUD and controls with respect to the optimal behavior predicted by the Rate Maximization Model, and (b) explore the relationship between social foraging strategies, prosocial behavior, and impulsivity. Here participants with SUD (n = 20) and a non-user control group (n = 20) were exposed to the Guaymas Foraging task (GFT), the Social Discounting task (SD), and the Delay Discounting task (DD). We found that participants in the control group tended to produce more and obtain higher profits in contrast to substance abuser groups. Additionally, SD and DD rates were higher for scroungers than producers regardless of the group. Our results suggest that producers tend to be more altruistic and less impulsive than scroungers. Knowing more about social strategies and producers' characteristics could help develop substance abuse prevention programs.

Decision-Making Under Risk and Uncertainty by Substance Abusers and Healthy Controls

Cognitive impairment characterized by high impulsivity and risk-taking has been correlated with substance-related disorders. However, it is unclear if the decision-making process is well known upon consideration of factors such as uncertainty environments, risk, and time manipulation in different decision-making procedures. The main objective of this study was to identify behavioral differences between substance abusers and healthy control participants in a behavioral test battery, including (1) two uncertainty decision-making tasks, the Balloon Analog Risk Task (BART) and the Iowa Gambling Task (IGT, trial 1-40); (2) three risk-taking tasks, the Columbia Card Task Hot version (CCT-hot), Columbia Card Task Cold version (CCT-cold), and the IGT (trial 41-100); and (3) an impulsivity task, the Delay Discounting task (DD). The second objective looked at how the six behavioral tests correlate. We worked with a sample of 54 adult participants (Substance abusers: n = 28; Healthy controls: n = 26). An anonymous survey website was created to execute all the cognitive tasks. The results showed no statistically significant differences between the groups in any of the tasks. However, the results showed an upward trend of impulsive (i.e., steeply discounting curve) and risk-taking behaviors (i.e., a low learning curve in IGT) in substance abuse participants. The factor analysis results showed four different main factors: (1) risk-taking task in the IGT (trial 40-100), (2) uncertainty task in BART, (3) impulsivity in DD, IGT (trial 1-40), and (4) deliberate process in the Columbia card task (cold and hot). We conclude that factors such as the uncertainty tasks in the BART and the first block of IGT trials, the risk cues in the CCT tasks (i.e., number of loss, number of gains, and loss cards), and the time to delivery in the DD task, can affect the complex decision-making process in both clinical and healthy groups.

The Role of User Behaviour in Improving Cyber Security Management

Information security has for long time been a field of study in computer science, software engineering, and information communications technology. The term 'information security' has recently been replaced with the more generic term cybersecurity. The goal of this paper is to show that, in addition to computer science studies, behavioural sciences focused on user behaviour can provide key techniques to help increase cyber security and mitigate the impact of attackers' social engineering and cognitive hacking methods (i.e., spreading false information). Accordingly, in this paper, we identify current research on psychological traits and individual differences among computer system users that explain vulnerabilities to cyber security attacks and crimes. Our review shows that computer system users possess different cognitive capabilities which determine their ability to counter information security threats. We identify gaps in the existing research and provide possible psychological methods to help computer system users comply with security policies and thus increase network and information security.

The Competence and Willingness to Consent to Research Among Patients with Heroin Dependence

BACKGROUND

Substance abuse research can raise ethical concerns about the comprehension and decision-making capacities of participants with drug dependence. In this study, the competence and willingness to consent to research participation were examined among patients with heroin dependence.

METHODS

Twenty patients with heroin dependence and 24 healthy controls were asked to indicate if they would consent to participate in a low- and high-risk study. The MacArthur Competence Assessment Tool-Clinical Research was used to assess their consent capacities.

RESULTS

Patients with heroin dependence and healthy controls did not differ significantly in their consent capacity scores. However, the patterns that underlay their decisions to consent and decline to participate in the two fictional studies were significantly different. Specifically, patients with heroin dependence were more likely to consent to participate in both studies, irrespective of the ratio of benefits to risks. Further, patients with heroin dependence who agreed to participate in the research studies did not demonstrate poorer decision-making capacities than their nonconsenting counterparts.

CONCLUSIONS

Although the decision-making capacities of patients with heroin dependence and healthy controls were similar, the patterns that underlay their decisions to consent or decline to participate in the studies differed significantly between the two groups. Future studies should identify the specific factors that account for these emergent group differences.

Sensitivity to gains during risky decision-making differentiates chronic cocaine users from stimulant-naïve controls

BACKGROUND

Chronic cocaine use has been consistently associated with decision-making impairments that contribute to the development and maintenance of drug-taking. However, the underlying cognitive processes of risk-seeking behaviours observed in chronic cocaine users (CU) have so far remained unclear. Here we therefore tested whether CU differ from stimulant-naïve controls in their sensitivity to gain, loss, and probability of loss information when making decisions under risk.

METHOD

A sample of 96 participants (56 CU and 40 controls) performed the no-feedback version of the Columbia Card Task, designed to assess risk-taking in relation to gain, loss, and probability of loss information. Additionally, cognitive performance and impulsivity were determined. Current and recent substance use was objectively assessed by toxicological urine and hair analysis.

RESULTS

Compared to controls, CU showed increased risk-seeking in unfavourable decision scenarios in which the loss probability was high and the returns were low, and a tendency for increased risk aversion in more favourable decision scenarios. In comparison to controls, CU were less sensitive to gain, but similarly sensitive to loss and probability of loss information. Further analysis revealed that individual differences in sensitivity to loss and probability of loss information were related to cognitive performance and impulsivity.

CONCLUSION

Reduced sensitivity to gains in people with CU may contribute to their propensity for making risky decisions. While these alterations in gain sensitivity might directly relate to cocaine use per se, the individual psychopathological profile of CU might moderate sensitivity to loss information.

Event-related potentials in response to feedback following risk-taking in the hot version of the Columbia Card Task

Given the importance of risk-taking in individuals' personal and professional life, several behavioral tasks for measuring the construct have been developed. Recently, a new task was introduced, the Columbia Card Task (CCT). This task measures participants' risk levels and establishes how sensitive participants are to gains, losses, and probabilities when taking risk. So far, the CCT has been examined in behavioral studies and in combination with several (neuro)biological techniques. However, no electroencephalography (EEG) research has been done on the task. The present study fills this gap and helps to validate this relatively new experimental task. To this end, n = 126 students were asked to complete self-reports (reward responsiveness, impulsiveness, and sensation-seeking) and to perform the CCT (and other risk tasks) in an EEG setup. The results show that feedback appraisal after risky decision-making in the CCT was accompanied by a feedback-related negativity (FRN) and a P300, which were stronger in response to negative than positive feedback. Correlations between the FRN and P300 difference wave on the one hand and risk-related self-reports and behavior on the other were nonsignificant and small, but were mostly in the expected direction. This pattern did not change after excluding participants with psychiatric/neurological disorders and outliers. Excluding participants with reversed (positive > negative) difference waves strengthened FRN correlations. The impact such individuals can have on the data should be taken into account in future studies. Regarding the CCT in particular, future studies should also address its oddball structure and its masking of true values (censoring).