School of Health, Medical, and Applied Sciences, Central Queensland University, Bundaberg, Queensland, Australia.
School of Psychology, Western Sydney University, Penrith, New South Wales, Australia.
Psychophysiology. 2017 Oct;54(10):1541-1548. doi: 10.1111/psyp.12897. Epub 2017 May 27.
Previous research has shown that individuals with substance use disorder equally value small and large magnitude rewards. This has led some researchers to conceptualize the problematic behaviors associated with this disorder as being, at least in part, caused by a deficiency in processing reward stimuli. Considering the documented similarities between substance use disorder and disordered gambling, the current study sought to investigate whether problem gamblers also display such an aberrant pattern of incentive processing. Skin conductance responses (SCRs) to small and large magnitude wins were recorded from 16 problem gamblers (PGs) and 16 healthy controls (HCs) while they completed a computer-simulated electronic gaming machine task. The results show that, while large wins elicited greater SCRs compared to small wins for the HC group, no difference in SCR amplitude was found following large and small wins in the PG group. These findings suggest that problem gamblers may be less effective at evaluating the value of incentives, and are discussed in terms of relevant theoretical frameworks.
先前的研究表明，物质使用障碍患者同样重视小幅度和大幅度的奖励。这导致一些研究人员将与这种障碍相关的问题行为概念化为，至少部分是由于处理奖励刺激的缺陷引起的。考虑到物质使用障碍和赌博障碍之间有记载的相似性，目前的研究旨在调查赌瘾者是否也表现出这种异常的激励处理模式。在 16 名赌瘾者（PGs）和 16 名健康对照组（HCs）完成计算机模拟电子游戏机任务时，记录了他们对小幅度和大幅度赢钱的皮肤电反应（SCR）。结果表明，虽然对于 HC 组来说，大赢钱比小赢钱引起更大的 SCR，但在 PG 组中，大赢钱和小赢钱后的 SCR 幅度没有差异。这些发现表明，赌瘾者可能在评估激励价值方面效率较低，并根据相关理论框架进行了讨论。
