Department of Psychiatry, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA.
Department of Psychology, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA.
Alcohol Alcohol. 2019 Jul 1;54(4):361-369. doi: 10.1093/alcalc/agz010.
Individuals in treatment for alcohol use disorder (AUD) display deficits across a broad range of cognitive processes. Disruptions in affective processing are understudied, but may be particularly important for interpersonal functioning and post-treatment adaptation. In particular, the role of sex in AUD-associated emotion processing deficits remains largely unaddressed and was a focus of the current investigation.
Fifty-six treatment seekers with AUD and 54 healthy community controls (N = 110) were administered an emotional face discrimination task. Non-affective tasks included a sex-discrimination task and two brief measures of executive functioning. Two measures of interpersonal function were included.
Emotion processing deficits were evident among women with AUD relative to other groups. This sex-contingent relationship was not observed in measures of executive function, sex-discrimination or interpersonal problems, although individuals with AUD performed more poorly on these measures.
Results were consistent with extant literatures examining cognitive, affective and interpersonal functioning among individuals with AUD, and provided novel evidence of vulnerability to alcohol-associated deficits in emotion processing among women. While similar sex-contingent effects were not apparent among other measures, results support modest interrelationships, specifically including the import of emotion processing to interpersonal functioning in AUD. These data offer guidance for further systematic investigation and highlight important considerations for future relapse-prevention and recovery-facilitation efforts.
接受酒精使用障碍（AUD）治疗的个体在广泛的认知过程中表现出缺陷。情感处理的中断研究不足，但对于人际功能和治疗后适应可能尤为重要。特别是，性别在 AUD 相关的情绪处理缺陷中的作用在很大程度上仍未得到解决，这也是当前研究的重点。
56 名寻求 AUD 治疗的患者和 54 名健康社区对照者（N=110）接受了情感面孔辨别任务。非情感任务包括性别辨别任务和两项简短的执行功能测量。包括两项人际功能测量。
与其他组相比，AUD 女性存在明显的情绪处理缺陷。虽然 AUD 患者在这些措施上表现较差，但在执行功能、性别辨别或人际问题方面没有观察到这种性别相关的关系。
结果与检查 AUD 患者认知、情感和人际功能的现有文献一致，并为女性对酒精相关情绪处理缺陷的易感性提供了新的证据。虽然其他措施没有出现类似的性别相关影响，但结果支持适度的相互关系，特别是包括情绪处理对 AUD 中人际功能的重要性。这些数据为进一步的系统研究提供了指导，并强调了未来预防复发和促进康复努力的重要考虑因素。
