INVESTIGADORES
PILATTI Angelina
artículos
Título:
Acute effects of alcohol intoxication on decision-making and impulsivity, in at-risk gamblers with or without problematic drinking
Autor/es:
VERA, BELÉN; PILATTI, ANGELINA; GARIMALDI, JAVIER; PAUTASSI, RICARDO M.
Revista:
Psychology & Neuroscience
Editorial:
American Psychological Association
Referencias:
Año: 2018
Resumen:
The study analyzed decision making under ambiguity and risk, impulsivity, and acuteeffects of alcohol intoxication on these processes in subjects exhibiting either one, both, ornone of these conditions: problem drinking and at-risk gambling involvement. Subjects(N 110, ages 18?57; 57.3% men) were evaluated on the Iowa Gambling Task (IGT;Bechara, Damasio, Damasio, & Anderson, 1994), the Game of Dice Task (GDT; Brand etal., 2005) and the Go-Stop Impulsivity Paradigm (GoStop; Dougherty, Mathias, & Marsh,2003) before and after the ingestion of an alcohol (inducing 0.45 g/kg) or a placebo drink.At-risk gamblers (ARG ) showed better performance on the IGT than not-at-risk gamblersand nongamblers (ARG ). ARG and subjects intoxicated with alcohol picked morecards than their respective controls from the high frequency of punishment decks. ARG without problematic drinking exhibited greater impulsivity in the GoStop (i.e., exhibited asignificantly lower percentage of response inhibition at the 50-ms latency) after theingestion of alcohol. GDT scores were unaffected by gambling, problem drinking, or acutealcohol dosing. The study confirmed the facilitatory effect of acute alcohol on impulsivity.A new and important finding was the altered IGT performance in ARGs. This is particularlystriking when considering that these are not pathological gamblers. Apparently, even thislow level of gambling severity is sufficient to alter decision making. The lower level ofsensitivity to frequency of punishment apparently improved performance in this population,but it can present risk for the development of more severe gambling behaviors, particularlywhen considering that the acute alcohol treatment increased their impulsivity and had anindependent effect upon sensitivity to punishment.
