Effects of the history of conduct disorder on the Iowa Gambling Tasks.

BACKGROUND

Recent research conducted with the Iowa Gambling Task (GT) suggests decision-making impairments in substance dependence, as well as behavior disorders such as conduct disorder and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder. However, little is known about the past history of conduct disorder on decision making. The purpose of this study was to test the possible effect of past history of conduct disorder on GT performance and how this factor could contribute to the performance on GT in alcohol-dependent patients.

METHODS

Four subject groups were tested: (1) alcohol-dependent patients with (n = 28) and (2) alcohol-dependent patients without (n = 28), a history of conduct disorder and (3) normal controls with (n = 10) and (4) normal controls without (n = 30) a history of conduct disorder. Demographic and alcohol-related variables were evaluated, and a decision-making task, "Iowa GT," both original and variant version, were applied.

RESULTS

As a whole, normal controls with a history of conduct disorder and alcohol-dependent patients with or without a history of conduct disorder show impaired decision making because of hypersensitivity to reward and hyposensitivity to punishment. However, no significant differences were noted between alcohol-dependent patients either with or without a history of conduct disorder on gambling performance.

CONCLUSIONS

These results indicate that the history of conduct disorder may contribute to impaired decision making on GT. Furthermore, this kind of decision-making pattern may represent one of common underlying mechanisms in both conduct disorder and alcohol dependence.