Psychology Department, San Diego State University, San Diego, California, USA.
Radiology Department, University of California, San Diego, California, USA.
Alcohol Clin Exp Res. 2022 Jul;46(7):1220-1232. doi: 10.1111/acer.14856. Epub 2022 May 25.
Alcohol intoxication impairs inhibitory control, resulting in disinhibited, impulsive behavior. The anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) plays an essential role in a range of executive functions and is sensitive to the effects of alcohol, which contributes to the top-down cognitive dysregulation. This study used a multimodal approach to examine the acute effects of alcohol on the neural underpinnings of inhibitory control, inhibition failures, and neurobehavioral optimization as reflected in trial-to-trial dynamics of post-error adjustments.
Adult social drinkers served as their own controls by participating in the Go/NoGo task during acute alcohol and placebo conditions in a multi-session, counterbalanced design. Distributed source modeling of the magnetoencephalographic signal was combined with structural magnetic resonance imaging to characterize the spatio-temporal dynamics of inhibitory control in the time-frequency domain.
Successful response inhibition (NoGo) elicited right-lateralized event-related theta power (4 to 7 Hz). Errors elicited a short-latency increase in theta power in the dorsal (dACC), followed by activity in the rostral (rACC), which may underlie an affective "oh, no!" orienting response to errors. Error-related theta in the dACC was associated with subsequent activity of the motor areas on the first post-error trial, suggesting the occurrence of post-error output adjustments. Importantly, a gradual increase of the dACC theta across post-error trials closely tracked improvements in accuracy under placebo, which may reflect cognitive control engagement to optimize response accuracy. In contrast, alcohol increased NoGo commission errors, dysregulated theta during correct NoGo withholding, and abolished the post-error theta enhancement of cognitive control.
Confirming the sensitivity of frontal theta to inhibitory control and error monitoring, the results support functional and temporal dissociation along the dorso-rostral axis of the ACC and the deleterious effects of alcohol on the frontal circuitry subserving top-down regulation. Over time, alcohol-induced disinhibition may give rise to compulsive drinking and contribute to alcohol misuse.
酒精中毒会损害抑制控制，导致行为不受抑制和冲动。前扣带皮层（ACC）在一系列执行功能中起着至关重要的作用，并且对酒精的影响很敏感，这导致了自上而下的认知失调。本研究采用多模态方法来研究酒精对抑制控制神经基础的急性影响，包括抑制失败和神经行为优化，这反映在错误后调整的试验间动态中。
成年社交饮酒者在多会话、平衡设计的急性酒精和安慰剂条件下，通过参与 Go/NoGo 任务作为自身对照。脑磁图信号的分布式源建模与结构磁共振成像相结合，以在时频域中描述抑制控制的时空动力学。
成功的反应抑制（NoGo）引起右侧事件相关θ功率（4 至 7 Hz）。错误引起背侧（dACC）θ功率的短潜伏期增加，随后是额侧（rACC）的活动，这可能是对错误的情感“哦，不！”定向反应的基础。dACC 中的错误相关θ与第一次错误后试验中运动区的后续活动相关，表明发生了错误后输出调整。重要的是，dACC 中的θ在错误后试验中逐渐增加，与安慰剂下准确性的提高密切相关，这可能反映了认知控制的参与，以优化反应准确性。相比之下，酒精增加了 NoGo 冲动错误，扰乱了正确的 NoGo 抑制时的θ，并且消除了认知控制的错误后θ增强。
证实了额叶θ对抑制控制和错误监测的敏感性，这些结果支持了 ACC 背-额方向的功能和时间分离，以及酒精对负责自上而下调节的额皮质电路的有害影响。随着时间的推移，酒精引起的去抑制可能导致强迫性饮酒，并导致酒精滥用。
