School of Psychology, University of Sussex, Brighton BN1 9QH, United Kingdom.
Sussex Addiction Research and Intervention Centre (SARIC), University of Sussex BN1 9QH, United Kingdom.
Learn Mem. 2019 Feb 15;26(3):66-76. doi: 10.1101/lm.048272.118. Print 2019 Mar.
Stimuli conditioned with a substance can generate drug-approach behaviors due to their acquired motivational properties. According to implicit theories of addiction, these stimuli can decrease cognitive control automatically. The present study ( = 49) examined whether reward-associated stimuli can interfere with cognitive processes in the absence of knowledge about stimulus-outcome contingencies. Conditioned stimuli (CS) were paired with high-reward (HR) or low-reward (LR) probabilities of monetary reward using a Pavlovian learning task. Participants were categorized as Aware or Unaware of contingencies using a Bayesian analysis. CS were then used as task-irrelevant distractors in modified flanker and -back tasks. Results show HR CS can generate increased interference in the flanker task for participants Unaware of contingencies, contributing further evidence for the existence of implicit Pavlovian conditioning. For the -back task, working memory performance was affected by HR CS, albeit only for Aware participants. These results suggest that CS can interfere implicitly with cognitive processes in a similar way to drug-related stimuli. Such an effect could occur in a stimulus-driven fashion, devoid of top-down goal-directedness. These findings have implications for the conceptualization and study of implicit processes in addiction and highlights the necessity to reconsider the measurement of such phenomena.
由于获得了动机属性，与物质相关联的刺激可以产生药物趋近行为。根据成瘾的内隐理论，这些刺激可以自动降低认知控制。本研究（n=49）检验了在不知道刺激-结果关联的情况下，奖励相关刺激是否可以在没有认知过程的情况下进行干扰。使用巴甫洛夫学习任务将条件刺激（CS）与高奖励（HR）或低奖励（LR）的货币奖励概率配对。使用贝叶斯分析将参与者分为有条件或无条件意识。然后，将 CS 用作修改后的侧抑制和返回任务中的无关分心物。结果表明，对于无条件意识的参与者，HR CS 可以在侧抑制任务中产生更大的干扰，这进一步证明了内隐巴甫洛夫条件作用的存在。对于返回任务，尽管只有有意识的参与者，但是 HR CS 会影响工作记忆性能。这些结果表明，CS 可以以类似与药物相关的刺激的方式隐式干扰认知过程。这种影响可能以刺激驱动的方式发生，而无需自上而下的目标导向。这些发现对成瘾中内隐过程的概念化和研究具有启示意义，并强调有必要重新考虑此类现象的测量。
