Using future-oriented expectancy associates to probe real-time variations in motivation to consume alcohol

An extensive empirical and theoretical literature has characterized anticipatory/expectancy processes as integral to motivation, including motivation to consume alcohol. To examine whether these processes could be probed on a moment to moment basis as they activate to motivate near term drinking, we...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inPsychology of addictive behaviors Vol. 33; no. 6; p. 540
Main Authors Benitez, Bryan, Goldman, Mark S
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published United States 01.09.2019
Subjects
Adolescent
Adult
Alcohol Drinking - psychology
Anticipation, Psychological
Culture
Female
Humans
Male
Motivation
Personality Assessment
Risk Factors
Social Environment
Word Association Tests
Young Adult
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Summary:An extensive empirical and theoretical literature has characterized anticipatory/expectancy processes as integral to motivation, including motivation to consume alcohol. To examine whether these processes could be probed on a moment to moment basis as they activate to motivate near term drinking, we sampled future-oriented expectancy verbal associates (i.e., self-generated words) using an ecological momentary assessment (EMA) paradigm every 3 hr on 3 days of the week (2 days of likely drinking and 1 of low drinking likelihood). Expectancy associates were chosen because cognitive psychologists consider verbal items collected in this manner a part-way approach to measurement of automatic/implicit processes. Consistent with predictions, more positively valenced alcohol expectancies activated within a few hours preceding increased alcohol consumption, and this activation could be statistically distinguished from the influence of a wide array of other variables known to predict consumption, including autocorrelation. As previously observed, more positively valenced alcohol expectancies were activated in alcohol-related environments. These findings provide further evidence that anticipatory information processing is engaged for the direction of future behavior, and that probing expectancies in real-time can be useful for predicting near-term alcohol consumption. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).
ISSN:1939-1501
DOI:10.1037/adb0000478