Anne-Marie Wall

Structural, concurrent, and predictive validity of the Substance Use Risk Profile Scale in early adolescence

A brief personality risk profile (23 items), the Substance Use Risk Profile Scale was tested for concurrent and predictive validity for substance use in 1139 adolescents (grades 8-10) from a mid-sized city in western Canada. The SURPS was administered in two waves of a longitudinal study separated by 12 months (2003-04). As expected, four subscales were supported by confirmatory factor and metric invariance analysis. In regression analysis, three subscales, hopelessness, impulsivity, and sensation seeking, were positively related to current and future use; while one, anxiety sensitivity, was negatively related. Findings suggest clinical utility for screening adolescents at risk for substance use.

Mood-Induced Increases in Alcohol Expectancy Strength in Internally Motivated Drinkers

This study investigated whether exposure to musical mood induction procedures (MMIP) differentially increases the strength of specific alcohol expectancies for coping motivated (CM) versus enhancement motivated (EM) drinkers. Participants were 86 undergraduates who had elevated scores on either the CM or EM subscale of the Drinking Motives Questionnaire (M. L. Cooper, 1994). Participants were randomly assigned to either a positive or negative mood condition. The Alcohol Craving Questionnaire (E. G. Singleton, S. T. Tiffany, & J. E. Henningfield, 1994) was administered at baseline and after MMIP to assess phasic changes in alcohol expectancy strength. Consistent with hypotheses, only CM drinkers in the negative mood condition reported increased relief expectancies, and only EM drinkers in the positive mood condition reported increased reward expectancies. Theoretical and clinical implications are discussed.

Context Effects on Alcohol Cognitions

This article summarizes a symposium on context and alcohol-related cognitions presented at the 2004 Annual Meeting of the Research Society on Alcoholism in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. The studies reported here examine how the manipulation of contextual variables influences the availability of alcohol outcome expectancies and implicit memories for alcohol associations. The symposium illustrates the range of context variables and shows some of the potential impact of retrieval on cognitions that predict alcohol use. Two of the studies explore naturalistic drinking contexts: one examines the impact of stress induction, and one assesses within survey question placement effects. A variety of measures of alcohol cognitions were used. The results demonstrate that alcohol cognitions are more accessible in alcohol-related contexts. Moreover, availability of alcohol associations and expectancies depended on individual differences. These results underscore the potential value of memory processes in the retrieval and measurement of alcohol cognitions. The findings have direct implications for improving methods of predicting alcohol use and in understanding the role of alcohol cognitions in various contexts associated with alcohol use.

Alcohol outcome expectancies and coping styles as predictors of alcohol use in young adults

This study was designed to examine the pattern and strength of relationships among coping styles and alcohol outcome expectancies with regard to drinking behavior in young adult social drinkers. Quantity and frequency of weekly consumption were used as criterion measures, and alcohol outcome expectancies/valences (CEOA: Fromme, Stroot & Kaplan, 1993) and coping styles (COPE: Carver, Scheier, & Weintraub, 1989) were used as predictor variables. For males, the expectancy of risk and aggression, and the valence of cognitive and behavioral impairment, were predictive of drinking behavior. For females, sociability valence and the expectancy of negative self-evaluation positively predicted the alcohol-use measures. With regards to coping styles, alcohol and drug disengagement and suppression of competing activities uniquely predicted alcohol use in males, whereas alcohol and drug disengagement, turning to religion, and behavioral disengagement were predictive of female alcohol use. In general, coping styles were more predictive of the alcohol-use measures than were alcohol-outcome expectancies. Practical implications of these results are highlighted.

Effects of an implicit mood prime on the accessibility of smoking expectancies in college women.

This study examined whether an implicit mood prime would differentially affect the accessibility of self-generated smoking expectancies in women. One hundred nine ever-smokers were randomly assigned to receive either a positive or negative musical mood induction or a no-music control condition. Participants self-generated smoking expectancies, and the 1st responses were categorized as positive reinforcement, negative reinforcement, or negative consequence expectancies. Overall, participants generated mood-congruent smoking expectancies, suggesting that affect may act as a conditioned stimulus that elicits expectations of positive and negative reinforcement of smoking behavior. In addition, negative reinforcement expectancies were more frequently generated in current versus past smokers. Results are consistent with a situational-specificity hypothesis and memory-based models of affect and expectancies.

Cue exposure during a period of abstinence reduces the resumption of operant behavior for oral ethanol reinforcement

The present study examined the prediction made by learning theories of drug addiction that systematic cue exposure (extinction) procedures should reduce ethanol (EtOH) consumption. In 3 experiments, male rats were trained on a variable-interval schedule to press a bar for a sweetened EtOH solution. These procedures established associations between a variety of cues (contextual, response feedback, visual, taste) and EtOH consumption. After performance had stabilized, a period of abstinence was imposed during which no EtOH was available. Groups of rats differed only in the number of EtOH-associated cues experienced during this period. The level of EtOH consumption after abstinence was reduced in proportion to the degree of cue exposure. These findings support the learning hypothesis that drug-associated cues contribute to the resumption of drug-taking behavior and further suggest that extinction procedures may be valuable in preventing relapse.

Perfectionism and binge drinking in Canadian students making the transition to university.

Objective: In September 2005, the authors explored the relationship between perfectionism and binge drinking in a sample of first-year college students. Participants: The authors recruited 207 first-year college students (76 men, 131 women) to complete the Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale (MPS) and Frost Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale (F-MPS). Methods: The authors divided participants into 3 groups on the basis of frequency of binge drinking and conducted multivariate analyses of variance to compare the binge drinking groups on the 3 MPS subscales and the 5 F-MPS subscales. Results: The group with 2 or more binge drinking episodes in the past 2 weeks had higher levels of parental criticism and lower levels of self-oriented perfectionism, but they did not have lower scores on a measure of personal standards. Conclusions: These findings suggest that certain perfectionists binge drink in response to harsh parental treatment and that, at least initially, the pursuit of extreme standards of personal perfection is incompatible with binge drinking. The authors discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these findings.

The effect of the CS-UCS interval and extinction on place conditioning and analgesic tolerance with morphine

In experiment 1, a CS-UCS interval study of place conditioning and analgesic tolerance with morphine was conducted. Morphine (10 mg/kg i.p.) was administered to separate groups of rats either 2 h prior to, 1 h prior to, immediately prior to, immediately after or 2 h after 30-min confinement in one end compartment of a place conditioning apparatus. A total of three choice tests was given, one after every six morphine injections. A preference for the end compartment contingent upon morphine injection was shown in groups that received morphine prior to end compartment placement. Groups that received morphine after end compartment placement were not different in their preference behavior from groups that received only saline during place conditioning training. A hot-plate test for tolerance to the analgesic effect of morphine was given at the end of all choice testing. All groups that had received morphine during place conditioning training were equally tolerant. These results indicate a dissociation between the analgesic effect of morphine and the effect that produces place preference, since the former was not affected by temporal parameters that did affect the latter. In the second experiment, the effect of extinction on a morphine-induced place preference was studied using extinction procedures that, in contrast to previous studies, equated exposure to both end compartments. Whereas the morphine-induced place preference was undiminished by a 10-day retention period in which animals received saline injections in the home cage, extinction trials during the same period eliminated the place preference. These results provide evidence that morphine-induced place preferences involve associative processes.

Place avoidance conditioning with D-amphetamine: the effect of screening and the use of preferred and non-preferred sides

The effect of screening animals to identify unconditioned preferences for stimuli used in subsequent place conditioning, and the effect of pairing drug injections with originally most or least preferred stimuli were investigated in place conditioning with 0.5 and 2.0 mg/kg D-amphetamine. A choice test to identify conditioned approach and avoidance responses was given after every two end compartment drug trials until a total of 10 choice tests had been given. During drug trials, the drug was injected 15 min after the animal was placed in the end compartment and the animal remained in the end compartment for 30 min following drug injection. In confirmation of previous research from our laboratory, during choice tests, animals avoided the end compartment that had been paired with D-amphetamine and this avoidance occurred regardless of whether the animals had been initially screened or not, and regardless of whether the originally most or least preferred stimuli were used as the drug-associated end compartment.

The Impact of Perceived Reinforcement From Alcohol and Involvement in Leisure Activities on Adolescent Alcohol Use

The purpose of the present study was to examine adolescent alcohol use within the context of youth involvement and reinforcement from alternative leisure activities and also to determine whether perceived reinforcement from alcohol (outcome expectancy liking [OEL]) impacts this relationship. Participants were 956 students in grades 7 through 9 who participated in the Project on Adolescent Trajectories and Health (PATH), a 3-year longitudinal study of adolescent risk behaviors and health outcomes. A path model included Time 1 and Time 3 youth self-reported alcohol use, Time 2 youth ratings of reinforcement potential from alternative activities and OEL scores, and Time 3 perceived access to alcohol. The final model provided a good fit for the data and revealed several significant paths. In particular, alcohol use was positively associated with reinforcement potential from party attendance and involvement in social activities, and negatively associated with reinforcement potential from religious involvement and involvement in home/family activities. In addition, OEL was a partial mediator for party attendance and religious activities. These findings highlight the need for prevention programs that focus on reducing adolescent alcohol use through increasing access to substitutable leisure activities that can compete with behaviors maintained by alcohols positive reinforcement value for youth.