Interactive Effects of Naturalistic Drinking Context and Alcohol Sensitivity on Neural Alcohol Cue-Reactivity Responses.

BACKGROUND: Considerable evidence indicates that a low level of subjective response to alcohol's acute effects (i.e., low sensitivity) is associated with enhanced risk for alcohol use disorder (AUD). Recent work suggests that the highest risk response profile consists of blunted sensitivity to alcohol's sedation-like effects, coupled with enhanced sensitivity to alcohol's stimulation-like effects (i.e., differential sensitivity). A largely separate body of work indicates that enhanced reactivity to alcohol-related cues is associated with increased AUD risk. AIMS: The current research examined the extent to which variability in alcohol response phenotypes is associated with enhanced P3 event-related potential (ERP) responses to alcohol-related pictures (ACR-P3), and whether this reactivity varies according to depicted drinking contexts. METHODS: Eighty young adults (aged 18 to 33 years) completed a self-report measure of alcohol sensitivity (the Alcohol Sensitivity Questionnaire) and viewed images depicting drinking in naturalistic contexts, alcohol and nonalcohol beverages in isolation (devoid of naturalistic drinking context), and neutral nonbeverage control images while ERPs were recorded. RESULTS: Results indicated that blunted sensitivity to alcohol's sedative-like effects was differentially associated with enhanced ACR-P3 but reduced P3 reactivity to nonalcohol cues. Variation in sensitivity to alcohol's stimulant-like effects was not associated with differential ACR-P3. Contrary to predictions, these effects were not potentiated by drinking contexts. CONCLUSIONS: The current results replicate and extend previous work linking low alcohol sensitivity with enhanced incentive salience for alcohol-related cues and suggest that cues depicting drinking contexts are less likely to differentiate high-risk from low-risk drinkers.

The Rutgers Alcohol Problem Index: Measurement equivalence among college students in the U.S. and Mexico.

The Rutgers Alcohol Problem Index (RAPI) is widely used to assess alcohol-related problems among college students within the U.S. and internationally. Despite its wide usage, whether the RAPI similarly assesses alcohol-related problems among students in different countries has not been established. We begin to address this issue by evaluating responses to the RAPI for measurement equivalence across college students in the U.S. (European Americans and Mexican Americans, treated as separate groups) and Mexico (Mexicans). Toward this end, we evaluated the RAPI for Differential Item Functioning (DIF) within an item response theory framework. Our results showed DIF for 6 item severities, all but one of which differed as a function of country (U.S. vs. Mexico). Additional analyses showed that using a latent RAPI variable with no DIF assumed had no substantive consequences in terms of group mean differences and zero-order correlations with self-reported drinking behaviors. Similarly, when using observed RAPI scale scores, there were no substantive differences in terms of correlations. The observed scale scores, however, led to inaccurate mean comparisons. Based on our results, we recommend that scholars model the RAPI as a latent variable when conducting analyses. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2018 APA, all rights reserved).

Sexual Victimization and Sex-Related Drinking Motives: How Protective is Emotion Regulation?

One in five college women experience sexual victimization (SV), and SV severity is associated with subsequent psychological distress, including sex-related distress. SV severity may also be associated with drinking motives to cope with sex-related distress and to enhance sex (sex-related drinking motives [SRDMs]), particularly if individuals suffer from emotion regulation (ER) difficulties. College women (N = 151) completed a survey assessment of ER, SV history, childhood sexual abuse (CSA), and SRDMs. Twelve regression models assessed six facets of ER as moderators between SV severity and SRDMs. Among women with no or low levels of prior SV severity, women with greater access to ER strategies were less likely to endorse drinking to cope SRDMs. At higher levels of SV severity, women at all levels of access to ER strategies were equally likely to endorse drinking to cope SRDMs, suggesting that access to ER strategies did not mitigate motivations to drink to cope with sex-related distress for these women. Women with severe SV histories may benefit from interventions that build on existing ER strengths or address other factors. However, greater access to ER strategies may serve as a protective factor against SRDMs when SV severity is low.

Associations between executive functioning, affect-regulation drinking motives, and alcohol use and problems.

Motivation to use alcohol to regulate positive and negative affect and deficits in cognitive control (i.e., executive functions [EFs]) have both been associated with increased alcohol involvement and alcohol-related consequences. Although dual-process models predict that affect-driven motivations and cognitive control should interact to determine alcohol involvement and alcohol-related consequences, this intersection has remained largely unexplored. The present study examined the extent to which effects of enhancement and coping drinking motives on alcohol use, heavy drinking, and alcohol-related consequences are moderated by individual differences in three theorized components of EF. We anticipated, in general, that drinking motives would more strongly predict alcohol use, heavy drinking, and alcohol-related consequences among individuals low versus high in cognitive control-EF. Participants (N = 801) completed a battery of nine EF tasks, as well as measures of drinking motives, alcohol use, heavy drinking, and alcohol-related negative consequences. A baseline structural model indicated that (a) both enhancement motives and coping motives predicted alcohol use and heavy drinking, (b) both enhancement and coping motives exerted their effects on alcohol-related consequences both directly and indirectly via alcohol use, and (c) shifting-specific abilities were modestly positively associated with heavy drinking. Most important for the aims of the study, latent variable interaction analyses failed to provide consistent evidence that better EF abilities attenuate the effects of drinking motives on alcohol use, heavy drinking, and alcohol-related consequences, as predicted. (PsycINFO Database Record

Does Drinking Improve the Quality of Sexual Experience?: Sex-Specific Alcohol Expectancies and Subjective Experience on Drinking Versus Sober Sexual Occasions.

The present study compared the self-reported quality of emotional experiences on sexual occasions that differed in levels of alcohol consumption to determine whether widely held beliefs about alcohol's positive effects on sex are borne out in people's everyday sexual experience. Multilevel models were estimated using data from 7442 discrete sexual events collected over a 10+ year period from a community sample of 1946 Black and White young adults. Tests of between-person differences revealed that beliefs that drinking both enhances and disinhibits sexual experience are widely endorsed, and that those who hold strong expectancies for enhancement drink significantly more on sexual occasions than those who do not. Nevertheless, tests of within-person differences revealed that people's sexual experiences were generally less positive on drinking than sober occasions, even after controlling for a host of individual difference and event-level characteristics. Moreover, cross-level expectancy × alcohol interaction tests showed that even those who strongly endorsed alcohol's positive effects failed to report more positive sexual experiences on drinking versus sober occasions, with a single exception: Those with strong expectancies for sexual enhancement reported greater arousal at high consumption levels, whereas those with weak enhancement expectancies reported lower arousal. In short, drinking on sexual occasions failed to deliver any benefit for the majority of individuals across the majority of outcomes. Why positive beliefs are maintained in the face of largely contradictory experience, and how this information can be used to inform intervention and prevention is explored.

Should Parents Allow Their Adolescent Children to Drink at Home? Family Factors as Predictors of Alcohol Involvement Trajectories Over 15 Years.

OBJECTIVE: The present study examined familial risk and protective factors as moderators of parents allowing their adolescent children to drink at home on longitudinal alcohol involvement trajectories. METHOD: A total of 772 community adolescents and their parents provided data beginning in 1989 and at four subsequent time points over 15 years; Black adolescents were intentionally oversampled (50% at baseline). RESULTS: Outcomes related to allowing adolescents to drink at home depended on family structure: Adolescents from intact families who were allowed to drink at home showed the lowest levels of alcohol use and problems over time, whereas those from nonintact families who were allowed to drink at home showed the highest levels of involvement. These results controlled for family history of alcohol problems, consistent parenting styles, and demographic characteristics. CONCLUSIONS: Results suggest that allowing adolescents to drink at home is neither inherently protective nor risky but depends on the family context. Implications for the development of adolescent alcohol involvement are discussed.

Bidirectional associations between alcohol use and sexual risk-taking behavior from adolescence into young adulthood.

Overwhelming evidence indicates that sexual risk-taking behavior and alcohol use are linked, but the nature, strength, and timing of these relations may differ between gender and racial subgroups. These issues were addressed by examining the course and interrelations of both behaviors from adolescence into young adulthood, as well as how these patterns differed between both men and women and between Blacks and Whites. Data came from a representative, community-based sample of 1867 urban participants surveyed up to 5 times over a 15-year period. Although both prospective and trajectory analyses showed that adolescent involvement in one behavior predicted later involvement in the other, most patterns were moderated by gender, race, or both. In general, positive, bidirectional associations were discovered among men and Whites. Among women, adolescent sexual risk-taking behavior positively predicted later drinking, but not vice versa. For Blacks, adolescent alcohol use was inconsistently related to later sexual risk-taking behavior, and adolescent sexual risk-taking negatively predicted later alcohol use. Results suggest that associations between sexual risk-taking behavior and alcohol use are more complex than previously thought and that an adequate understanding of these links must account for both gender and racial differences.

Dispositional drinking motives: associations with appraised alcohol effects and alcohol consumption in an ecological momentary assessment investigation.

Alcohol use can be understood as a strategic behavior, such that people choose to drink based on the anticipated affective changes produced by drinking relative to those produced by alternative behaviors. This study investigated whether people who report drinking for specific reasons via the Drinking Motives Questionnaire-Revised (DMQ-R; Cooper, 1994) actually experience the alcohol effects they purportedly seek. As a secondary goal, we examined relations between drinking motives and indices of the amount of alcohol consumed. Data were drawn from 3,272 drinking episodes logged by 393 community-recruited drinkers during a 21-day Ecological Momentary Assessment investigation. After accounting for selected covariates, DMQ-R enhancement motives uniquely predicted real-time reports of enhanced drinking pleasure. DMQ-R coping motives were associated with reports of increased drinking-contingent relief and punishment. Enhancement motives uniquely predicted consuming more drinks per episode and higher peak intra-episode estimated blood alcohol concentration. The findings extend the evidence for the validity of the DMQ-R motive scores by demonstrating that internal drinking motives (enhancement and coping) are related to the experienced outcomes of drinking in the manner anticipated by theory.

Rebound sex: Sexual motives and behaviors following a relationship breakup.

The present study used a longitudinal, online diary method to examine trajectories of psychological recovery and sexual experience following a romantic relationship breakup among 170 undergraduate students. Consistent with popular beliefs about rebound and revenge sex, having sex to cope with distress and to get over or get back at the ex-partner were elevated immediately following the breakup and then declined over time, as did the probability of having sex with a new partner. Also consistent with popular lore, those who were "dumped" by their partners were more distressed and angry and more likely to have sex to cope and to get back at or get over their ex-partner. Finally, individuals who reported having sex to cope with negative feelings or to get over their ex-partner at the beginning of the study were more likely to have sex with a stranger and to continue having sex with new partners over time. Results were discussed in terms of widely held but largely untested beliefs about rebound and revenge sex.

Body satisfaction and couple's daily sexual experience: a dyadic perspective.

Although it is widely believed that body satisfaction positively affects sexual experience, research on this topic has been limited by an almost exclusive focus on women and on individuals and by an overreliance on cross-sectional self-report data. To address these shortcomings, the current study used 1,598 daily sex reports completed by 144 couples over an average of 3 weeks to investigate the impact of satisfaction with one's own and one's partner's body on sexual experience. Results indicated that an individual's satisfaction with his or her own body was not as important to the overall quality of sexual experience as one's satisfaction with the partner's body or as the partner's satisfaction with the individual's body. Moreover, although effects were generally similar for men and women, women's sexual outcomes were more strongly shaped by partner satisfaction with her body than the reverse. Results highlight the need to adopt a dyadic perspective in efforts to understand the effects of body satisfaction on sexual experience.

Confirmatory factor analysis of the Brazilian version of the Drinking Motives Questionnaire-Revised (DMQ-R).

The main objective of this study was to evaluate the factor structure of the Brazilian version of the Drinking Motives Questionnaire-Revised (DMQ-R; Cooper, 1994) in a sample of 584 university students. A secondary goal was to investigate the relationships between motives and measures of alcohol use and drinking problems. The DMQ-R assesses four motive dimensions: social, enhancement, coping, and conformity. Confirmatory factor analysis supported a revised four-factor model identical to the original, with the exception of one item that did not load on its intended factor. Relative to coping and conformity motives, enhancement and social motives were strongly related to both alcohol use and drinking problems. Overall results indicate that the factor structure of the Brazilian DMQ-R parallels that observed in North America and Europe using the original English language DMQ-R, despite a distinct pattern of relationships with alcohol use and drinking problems.

The relationship between rs3779084 in the dopa decarboxylase (DDC) gene and alcohol consumption is mediated by drinking motives in regular smokers.

BACKGROUND: Motivational models of alcohol use propose that the motivation to consume alcohol is the final common pathway to its use. Both alcohol consumption and drinking motives are influenced by latent genetic factors that partially overlap. This study investigated whether drinking motives mediate the associations between alcohol consumption and 2 single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) from genes involved in serotonin (TPH2; rs1386496) and dopamine synthesis (DDC; rs3779084). Based on earlier work showing that enhancement and coping motives were heritable in regular smokers but not in nonregular smokers, we hypothesized these motives would mediate the relationships between alcohol consumption and these SNPs in regular smokers. METHODS: Drinking motives data were available from 830 young adult female twins (n = 344 regular smokers and n = 486 never/nonregular smokers). We used confirmatory factor analyses to model enhancement, coping, and alcohol consumption factors and to conduct mediation analyses in the regular smoker and never/nonregular smoker groups. RESULTS: Our hypothesis was partially supported. The relationship between alcohol consumption and rs1386496 was not mediated by drinking motives in either group. However, in the regular smokers, the relationship between alcohol consumption and rs3779084 was mediated by enhancement and coping motives. Carriers of the rs3779084 minor allele who were regular smokers reported more motivation to consume alcohol. Given this pattern of results was absent in the never/nonregular smokers, our results are consistent with a gene × smoking status interaction. CONCLUSIONS: In regular smokers, variability at the locus marked by rs3779084 in the DDC gene appears to index biologically based individual differences in the motivation to consume alcohol to attain or improve a positive affective state or to relieve a negative one. These results could be because of increased sensitivity to the reinforcing effects of alcohol among minor allele carriers who smoke, which might be due to structural or functional differences in mesorticolimic dopamine "reward" circuitry.

Motivational pursuits in the context of human sexual relationships.

The current article examines how close relationships combine with individual differences in sex motives (Cooper, Shapiro, & Powers, 1998) to shape sexual experience. We first provide an overview of the motivational approach as it relates to sexual behavior and then describe 2 broad mechanisms (1 transactional, the other interactional) by which motives and relational context combine to shape behavior. Drawing on our past research, we review evidence showing that people select relationship contexts based partly on their motives and that these contexts in turn shape future motives and behavior; that partner motives shape sexual experience above and beyond one's own motives; and that both the broader relationship context and partner motives moderate the effects of one's own motives on sexual experience. We conclude that the nature of motivational pursuits cannot be adequately understood in the abstract, but rather we must take into account the relational context in which one's needs are pursued.

Measurement of motivations for and against sexual behavior.

A multidimensional measure assessing distinct motivations for and against sex was shown to be reliable, valid, and configurally invariant among incoming first-year college students. Three Motivations Against Sex Questionnaire subscales were developed to measure motivations against sexual behavior (Values, Health, Not Ready) to complement and extend a set of Sexual Motivations Scale-Revised subscales assessing motivations for sexual behavior (Intimacy, Enhancement, Coping). Participants were surveyed the summer prior to college (N = 1,653; 58.4% female). Exploratory factor analysis on a random one quarter of respondents supported the hypothesized factors. Multigroup confirmatory factor analysis demonstrated good overall fit to the data and configural invariance across gender and ethnicity and across lifetime sexual experience. Motivations were associated with lifetime oral and penetrative sexual behaviors. This combined measure may be used for identifying motivations, predicting behaviors, and tailoring motivational interventions for sexual health among adolescents and young adults.

Drinking motives in female smokers: factor structure, alcohol dependence, and genetic influences.

BACKGROUND: Alcohol and tobacco use often co-occur. Human and animal studies indicate that nicotine increases alcohol's rewarding effects and the motivation to consume it. The aims of this study were to examine whether the factorial architecture of self-reported motivations to consume alcohol differed between regular and nonregular cigarette smokers while taking into account the lifetime history of alcohol dependence and psychopathology, and to estimate the genetic and environmental influences on the motivations. METHODS: Using data on 2,189 monozygotic and dizygotic female twins, we examined the factorial structure (item thresholds and factor loadings, means, and variances) of the items from the Drinking Motives Questionnaire (DMQ) in regular and nonregular smokers. Post hoc tests examined the association between the latent drinking motives factors and alcohol dependence in both groups. Twin models were fitted to the latent drinking motives factors, testing for variations in the magnitude of additive genetic, shared, and nonshared environmental influences between the groups. RESULTS: The 4 DMQ factors (social, conformity, coping, and enhancement) were recovered in both groups, and their measurement structure was consistent across the groups. Regular smokers reported higher levels of coping, enhancement, and social motives while nonregular smokers reported higher conformity motives. Alcohol dependence was associated with higher scores on all motives in both groups; however, in a regression analysis that included all of the motives as predictor variables, only coping was significantly related to alcohol dependence. While twin models revealed evidence for substantially greater genetic influences on enhancement (h² = 0.40), coping (h² = 0.35) and social (h² = 0.37) drinking motives in regular compared to nonregular smokers, the power to statistically distinguish the 2 groups was low. CONCLUSIONS: While the measurement structure of the drinking motive factors appears to be similar across regular and nonregular smokers, regular smokers report more motivation to drink for internal affect-related reasons and to obtain social reward. Of all the motives, coping was the most robust predictor of alcohol dependence in both the regular and the nonregular smokers. Further, genetic influences might play a larger role in drinking motives among regular smokers, which provides tentative evidence for latent genetic × smoking status interactions.

Daily alcohol use and romantic relationship functioning: evidence of bidirectional, gender-, and context-specific effects.

Whether beneficial or harmful, cause or effect, the nature of associations between drinking and close relationship processes remains unclear. The present study examined these issues by using daily reports of alcohol use and relationship functioning from 69 heterosexual couples over 3 weeks. Multilevel modeling indicated that alcohol had both positive and negative effects on relationship processes and that effects were more positive for women, and when small amounts were consumed, partners drank together, or they consumed similar amounts. Interestingly, however, positive effects on intimacy and partner behaviors were not mediated by sexual contact. In the reverse direction, women were found to drink more than men in response to relationship difficulties and feeling disconnected from their partner (i.e., low intimacy). Overall findings indicate that associations between drinking and relationship processes are complex and bidirectional and that they may be more important for women than men.

Drinking to have fun and to get drunk: motives as predictors of weekend drinking over and above usual drinking habits.

Most evidence on the motives-alcohol use link has come from cross-sectional research using retrospective assessments. It remains also to be demonstrated whether motives predict drinking in particular circumstances. In the present study, drinking motives assessed 2 weeks prior to a diary study were used to predict the number of drinks on weekend days as reported via short message service (SMS). Multilevel regression models were estimated based on 391 reports from 55 participants (mean age 22.7). The results revealed that enhancement motives but not gender, age, or social, coping, or conformity motives predicted weekend drinking over and above usual consumption. Consumption and motives together explained more than three-quarters of the inter-individual variance in weekend drinking. To conclude, this study points to a heavy episodic weekend drinking culture of young people who drink large quantities on Friday and Saturday nights apparently because they are seeking fun and excitement. Preventive measures should aim to counteract young people's drinking at peak times and in high-risk situations.

Toward a person x situation model of sexual risk-taking behaviors: illuminating the conditional effects of traits across sexual situations and relationship contexts.

The present study examines the individual and joint contributions of personality, situations, and relationship contexts as they shape risky sexual behaviors. Data on 7,511 discrete sexual events collected from a community sample of 1,946 young adults were analyzed with multilevel modeling. Results showed that meaningful between-persons differences in risky sexual behavior exist and that these differences are predictable in theoretically reasonable ways by interindividual differences in personality. However, the majority of variance in risky behaviors was at the within-person level and could be reliably explained by within-person changes in personality, the situation, and the relationship context. Finally, personality interacted with context such that personality more strongly predicted risky behaviors in contexts that were ostensibly novel and ambiguous. Together these results suggest that risky sexual behaviors cannot be understood in a static, typical, or decontextualized way but rather must be viewed as a complex product of the person, the situation, and the relationship context.