Cognitive Neurophysiology, Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Carl Gustav Carus Faculty of Medicine, Germany.
Experimental Neurobiology, National Institute of Mental Health, Czech Republic.
Addict Biol. 2018 Jan;23(1):503-514. doi: 10.1111/adb.12470. Epub 2016 Oct 27.
The effects of high-dose ethanol intoxication on cognitive flexibility processes are not well understood, and processes related to hangover after intoxication have remained even more elusive. Similarly, it is unknown in how far the complexity of cognitive flexibility processes is affected by intoxication and hangover effects. We performed a neurophysiological study applying high density electroencephalography (EEG) recording to analyze event-related potentials (ERPs) and perform source localization in a task switching paradigm which varied the complexity of task switching by means of memory demands. The results show that high-dose ethanol intoxication only affects task switching (i.e. cognitive flexibility processes) when memory processes are required to control task switching mechanisms, suggesting that even high doses of ethanol compromise cognitive processes when they are highly demanding. The EEG and source localization data show that these effects unfold by modulating response selection processes in the anterior cingulate cortex. Perceptual and attentional selection processes as well as working memory processes were only unspecifically modulated. In all subprocesses examined, there were no differences between the sober and hangover states, thus suggesting a fast recovery of cognitive flexibility after high-dose ethanol intoxication. We assume that the gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABAergic) system accounts for the observed effects, while they can hardly be explained by the dopaminergic system.
高剂量乙醇中毒对认知灵活性过程的影响尚不清楚，而与中毒后宿醉相关的过程则更加难以捉摸。同样，人们也不知道认知灵活性过程的复杂性在多大程度上受到中毒和宿醉的影响。我们进行了一项神经生理学研究，应用高密度脑电图（EEG）记录来分析事件相关电位（ERP），并在任务转换范式中进行源定位，该范式通过记忆需求来改变任务转换的复杂性。结果表明，只有在需要记忆过程来控制任务转换机制时，高剂量乙醇中毒才会影响任务转换（即认知灵活性过程），这表明即使是高剂量的乙醇也会在要求很高的情况下损害认知过程。EEG 和源定位数据表明，这些影响是通过调节前扣带皮层中的反应选择过程来实现的。感知和注意力选择过程以及工作记忆过程只是特异性地受到调节。在所有检查的子过程中，清醒状态和宿醉状态之间没有差异，因此表明在高剂量乙醇中毒后认知灵活性恢复很快。我们假设γ-氨基丁酸（GABAergic）系统解释了观察到的影响，而这些影响很难用多巴胺系统来解释。
