Freichel René, Christensen Erynn, Mrkonja Lana, de Jong Peter J, Cousijn Janna, Franken Ingmar, Yücel Murat, Lee Rico, Veer Ilya M, Albertella Lucy, Wiers Reinout W
Addiction Development and Psychopathology (ADAPT)-lab, Department of Psychology, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
BrainPark, Turner Institute for Brain and Mental Health and School of Psychological Sciences, Monash University, Clayton, Australia BrainPark, Clayton, Australia.
Addict Behav Rep. 2024 Feb 13;19:100534. doi: 10.1016/j.abrep.2024.100534. eCollection 2024 Jun.
Attentional biases towards reward stimuli have been implicated in substance use-related problems. The value-modulated attentional capture (VMAC) task assesses such reward-related biases. The VMAC task widely used in lab studies tends to be monotonous and susceptible to low effort. We therefore tested a gamified online version of the VMAC that aimed to increase participant engagement. Our goal was to examine how VMAC is associated with substance use-related problems and addictive behaviors, and whether this association is moderated by cognitive control.
We recruited 285 participants from an online community, including heavy alcohol users. All participants completed a novel gamified version of the VMAC task, measures of substance use and addictive behaviors (addictive-like eating behavior, problematic smartphone use), the WebExec measure of problems with executive functions, and the Stroop Adaptive Deadline Task (SDL) as a measure of cognitive control.
The gamified VMAC task successfully identified value-modulated attentional capture effects towards high-reward stimuli. We found no significant associations between VMAC scores, problematic alcohol or cannabis use, addictive behaviors, or any moderation by a behavioral measure of cognitive control. Exploratory analyses revealed that self-reported cognitive problems were associated with more alcohol-, and cannabis-related problems, and addictive behaviors. Greater attentional capture (VMAC) was associated with more cannabis use-related problems among individuals with higher levels of self-reported cognitive problems.
Our study is one of the first to demonstrate the utility of the gamified version of the VMAC task in capturing attentional reward biases. Self-reported problems with cognitive functions represent a key dimension associated with substance use-related problems and addictive behaviors.
对奖励刺激的注意力偏差与物质使用相关问题有关。价值调制注意力捕获（VMAC）任务可评估此类与奖励相关的偏差。实验室研究中广泛使用的VMAC任务往往单调乏味且容易导致参与者积极性不高。因此，我们测试了一个游戏化的在线版VMAC，旨在提高参与者的参与度。我们的目标是研究VMAC如何与物质使用相关问题和成瘾行为相关联，以及这种关联是否受认知控制的调节。
我们从一个在线社区招募了285名参与者，包括重度饮酒者。所有参与者都完成了一个全新的游戏化版本的VMAC任务、物质使用和成瘾行为（成瘾性饮食行为、问题性智能手机使用）的测量、执行功能问题的WebExec测量，以及作为认知控制测量的Stroop自适应截止任务（SDL）。
游戏化的VMAC任务成功识别出对高奖励刺激的价值调制注意力捕获效应。我们发现VMAC分数、问题性酒精或大麻使用、成瘾行为之间没有显著关联，也没有发现认知控制行为测量的任何调节作用。探索性分析显示，自我报告的认知问题与更多与酒精和大麻相关的问题以及成瘾行为有关。在自我报告认知问题水平较高的个体中，更大的注意力捕获（VMAC）与更多与大麻使用相关的问题有关。
我们的研究是首批证明游戏化版本的VMAC任务在捕获注意力奖励偏差方面效用的研究之一。自我报告的认知功能问题是与物质使用相关问题和成瘾行为相关的一个关键维度。
