Laboratory for Experimental Psychopathology, Psychological Science Research Institute, Université catholique de Louvain, Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium.
Univ. Lille, CNRS, UMR 9193 - SCALab - Sciences Cognitives et Sciences Affectives, Lille, France.
J Stud Alcohol Drugs. 2018 Sep;79(5):733-740.
Excessive alcohol drinking, particularly among college students, is a major health concern worldwide. The implicit associations between alcohol-related concepts and affective attributes have been repeatedly postulated as a reliable predictor of these drinking behaviors. The Implicit Association Test (IAT) is considered one of the most reliable tasks for measuring these associations and their impact on actual alcohol consumption. However, the majority of these tests used verbal materials as stimuli, thus being unadapted to some categories of participants. The present study aims to develop a new IAT, using pictures exclusively as stimuli, to provide a cross-cultural and language-independent evaluation of implicit associations that is more closely related to real-life drinking contexts.
Sixty-five undergraduate young adults took part in this study. A new visual IAT was used to measure the implicit association between alcohol cues and alcohol-related positive attributes. Pictorial stimuli, previously validated, were used to represent both target (alcohol vs. soft drinks) and attribute (positive vs. neutral affective states) categories in seven successive experimental blocks. The IAT was followed by self-reported measures of explicit alcohol-related expectancies and alcohol consumption.
The new IAT highlighted significant implicit associations between positively valenced and alcohol-related representations conveyed by pictures, with good internal consistency, thus proving its validity and reliability. Importantly, regression analyses showed that these implicit associations are a strong predictor of self-reported alcohol consumption.
This visual IAT further underscores that positive implicit associations with alcohol constitute an important factor in predicting effective alcohol-related behaviors and offers a more ecological and cross-cultural way to test these associations in non-alcohol-dependent populations. Moreover, this version of the IAT might be implemented in prevention and prophylactic programs.
酗酒，尤其是大学生酗酒，是全球范围内的一个主要健康问题。人们反复提出，与酒精相关的概念和情感属性之间的内隐联想是这些饮酒行为的可靠预测指标。内隐联想测验（IAT）被认为是衡量这些关联及其对实际饮酒量影响的最可靠任务之一。然而，这些测试大多使用语言材料作为刺激物，因此不适应某些类别的参与者。本研究旨在开发一种新的 IAT，仅使用图片作为刺激物，以提供一种与现实生活中饮酒情境更相关的跨文化和语言独立的内隐联想评估。
65 名本科青年参加了这项研究。使用新的视觉 IAT 来衡量酒精线索和与酒精相关的积极属性之间的内隐联想。使用经过验证的图片刺激来代表七个连续实验块中的目标（酒精与软饮料）和属性（积极与中性情感状态）类别。IAT 之后是对明确的与酒精相关的期望和酒精摄入量的自我报告测量。
新的 IAT 突出了图片所传达的积极评价和与酒精相关的表示之间的显著内隐联想，具有良好的内部一致性，从而证明了其有效性和可靠性。重要的是，回归分析表明，这些内隐联想是自我报告的酒精摄入量的一个强有力的预测因素。
这种视觉 IAT 进一步强调，与酒精的积极内隐联想是预测有效酒精相关行为的一个重要因素，并提供了一种更具生态性和跨文化的方法来测试非酒精依赖人群中的这些关联。此外，这种 IAT 版本可能会被应用于预防和预防计划中。
