Brown2018_Article_AttentionalCaptureByAlcohol-re.pdf (758.5 kB)
Attentional capture by alcohol-related stimuli may be activated involuntarily by top-down search goals
journal contribution
posted on 2023-06-09, 12:59 authored by Christ R H Brown, Dora Duka, Sophie ForsterSophie ForsterPrevious research has found that the attention of social drinkers is preferentially oriented towards alcohol related stimuli (attentional capture). This is argued to play a role in escalating craving for alcohol that can result in hazardous drinking. According to Incentive theories of drug addiction, the stimuli associated with the drug reward acquire learned incentive salience, and grab attention. However, it is not clear whether the mechanism by which this bias is created is a voluntary or an automatic one, although some evidence suggests a stimulus-driven mechanism. Here we test for the first time whether this attentional capture could reflect an involuntary consequence of a goal-driven mechanism. Across three experiments, participants were given search goals to detect either an alcoholic or a non-alcoholic object (target) in a stream of briefly presented objects unrelated to the target. Prior to the target, a task-irrelevant parafoveal distractor appeared. This could either be congruent or incongruent with the current search goal. Applying a meta-analysis, we combined the results across the three experiments and found consistent evidence of goal-driven attentional capture; whereby alcohol distractors impeded target detection when the search goal was for alcohol. By contrast, alcohol distractors did not interfere with target detection while participants were searching for a non-alcoholic category. A separate experiment revealed that the goal-driven capture effect was not found when participants held alcohol features active in memory but did not intentionally search for them. These findings suggest a strong goal-driven account of attentional capture by alcohol cues in social drinkers.
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Publication status
- Published
File Version
- Published version
Journal
PsychopharmacologyISSN
0033-3158Publisher
Springer VerlagExternal DOI
Issue
7Volume
235Page range
2087-2099Department affiliated with
- Psychology Publications
Full text available
- Yes
Peer reviewed?
- Yes
Legacy Posted Date
2018-04-23First Open Access (FOA) Date
2018-06-06First Compliant Deposit (FCD) Date
2018-04-20Usage metrics
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