Elsevier

Addictive Behaviors

Volume 44, May 2015, Pages 23-28
Addictive Behaviors

Decision making about alcohol use: The case for scientific convergence

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.addbeh.2014.12.001Get rights and content

Highlights

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    Cognitive processes predict drinking as well or better than any other predictor.

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    One theme may be shared by seemingly separate cognitive constructs: anticipation.

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    Anticipatory processes are evident at many neurobiological and behavioral levels.

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    Anticipatory processes seem to have a causal influence on drinking.

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    Anticipatory processes should be considered as a target for prevention efforts.

Abstract

Research on cognitive processes related to the decision to drink alcohol has yielded assessment tools that predict drinking as well or better than any other predictor. Although largely overlapping in content, some of these tools have been issued from different theoretical perspectives and consequently have been named to reflect separate cognitive constructs. This article describes a single theme that may be shared by what now appear to be separate constructs: anticipatory information processing. These anticipatory processes are reviewed at multiple levels of analysis, from neurobiology, to learning and memory, and finally to behavioral choice. Evidence supporting anticipatory processing as a causal influence on drinking also is reviewed, along with evidence that these ideas may be usefully applied to prevention/treatment efforts.

Section snippets

Anticipation

Anticipation is a fundamental neurobiological process, probably carried out by a number of systems in the brain. Framing the neurobiological basis of anticipation recently in the New York Times, Andy Clark (2012) said: “…the brain is complex, and builds new solutions upon old, perhaps resulting in a rather messy and hard-to-unravel edifice. Nonetheless, there can be fundamental processing ploys at work even in superficially much ‘messier’ systems and the claim is indeed that the use of

A broad perspective on anticipation

Because time always moves forward, if organisms' behavior were solely reactions to external circumstances as they were unfolding, the next moment would have already happened as the organism was responding to the previous moment. This inevitable response delay clearly would be an evolutionary disadvantage. As a result, organisms have been shaped by evolution to be ready for not yet encountered situations. In this vein, the brain and nervous system of higher organisms have evolved to use

Evidence of anticipatory processes in brain reward systems

Anticipatory processes of the kind noted above have been extensively implicated in the neurobiology of animal and human reward and reinforcement (Breiter et al., 2001, Kupfermann et al., 2000, McClure et al., 2004, Schultz, 2004, Schultz et al., 1997). Previous research even has revealed brain circuitry that is differentially active in anticipation, rather than in response to rewards (Glimcher and Lau, 2005, McClure et al., 2004; Minamimoto et al., 2005, Tobler et al., 2005). In a relatively

Anticipation as embodied in complex psychological systems

Described at a different level (scale), these brain systems manifest themselves in terms we commonly refer to as psychological processes; e.g., perception, learning, memory, and language (among others). Although psychology has a history of separating these processes for study, it is important to appreciate that they are not distinct; each of these processes is thoroughly integrated with the others.

Conclusion and future directions

It is, of course, a complex cascade of the multiple influences described above that influences the decision to drink. As with all decisions, neural processing pathways use various kinds of information collected in the past, and interwoven with current contextual circumstances, to set up a competition between “go” signals, “stop” signals, and “do something else” signals. Three-plus decades of alcohol-related cognition research have suggested that it is possible to probe at least some aspects of

Role of funding source

Funding for this study was provided by the National Institute of Alcoholism and Alcohol Abuse (NIAAA). NIAAA had no role in writing the manuscript or the decision to submit the paper for publication.

Contributors

Authors Reich and Goldman collaborated equally in collecting the relevant literature and writing the manuscript. Both authors have approved the final manuscript.

Conflict of interest

Both authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest.

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