Craving Mediates Stress in Predicting Lapse During Alcohol Dependence Treatment.

BACKGROUND: Stress, craving, and depressed mood have all been implicated in alcohol use treatment lapses. Few studies have examined all 3 factors. Progress has been limited because of difficulties with craving assessment. The Alcohol Craving Experience Questionnaire (ACE) is a new measure of alcohol craving. It is both psychometrically sound and conceptually rigorous. This prospective study examines a stress-treatment response model that incorporates mediation by craving and moderation by depressed mood and pharmacotherapy. METHODS: Five hundred and thirty-nine consecutively treated alcohol-dependent patients voluntarily participated in an abstinence-based 12-week cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) program at a hospital alcohol and drug outpatient clinic. Measures of stress, craving, depressed mood, and alcohol dependence severity were administered prior to treatment. Treatment lapse and treatment dropout were assessed over the 12-week program duration. RESULTS: Patients reporting greater stress experienced stronger and more frequent cravings. Stronger alcohol craving predicted lapse, after controlling for dependence severity, stress, depression, and pharmacotherapy. Alcohol craving mediated stress to predict lapse. Depressed mood and anticraving medication were not significant moderators. CONCLUSIONS: Among treatment seeking, alcohol-dependent patients, craving mediated the relationship between stress and lapse. The effect was not moderated by depressed mood or anticraving medication.

Propositional speech in unselected stroke: The effect of genre and external support.

Distinguished from nominal language, propositional language generation refers to the spontaneous and voluntary aspect of language that introduces novel concepts to a specific context. Propositional language can be impaired in a range of neurological disorders, including stroke, despite well-preserved nominal language. Although external support can increase speech rate in patients with reduced propositional speech, no specific investigation of propositional speech has been carried out in unselected stroke patients. The current study investigated propositional language in an unselected post-acute stroke group (N = 18) with mild cognitive impairment and prominent executive dysfunction, but without significant aphasia. Specifically, we investigated whether genre or external support affected the number of words, sentences, and novel ideas produced, compared to healthy controls (N = 27). Results showed that discourse genre was not associated with differential performances. By contrast, speech quantity increased without external support although, for stroke patients, speech novelty decreased. Overall, the novelty deficit in unselected stroke patients highlights the importance of assessing cognition and propositional speech. Our findings suggest that for stroke patients with mild cognitive deficits, including executive dysfunction, introducing external support improved speech quality but not quantity. Implications for both assessment and rehabilitation of social communication are discussed.