Item Details

title

FROM CUES TO CONSUMPTION: UNRAVELING THE COMPLEX RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN DESIRE FOR ALCOHOL, THE INFLUENCE OF THE AUTONOMIC NERVOUS SYSTEM, AND NEUROBIOLOGICAL FUNCTION DURING ABSTINENCE IN HEAVY ALCOHOL CONSUMERS

author

Peterson-Sockwell, Hope

abstract

Alcohol is one of the most highly used substances of abuse, with more than half of U.S. adults reporting alcohol consumption in the past month, at any given point in time. Disordered alcohol use, and specifically clinically diagnosable alcohol use disorders (AUD) have been widely studied in psychological and biological research, but the population of alcohol consumers who drink heavily yet do not qualify for an AUD are historically understudied. Their alcohol use puts them at risk of suffering detrimental health effects, but for many their heavy alcohol use is still considered socially acceptable. This study was designed to assess the experience of heavy alcohol consumers, and specifically how their psychological and physiological experience is altered by a brief period of alcohol abstinence, as cessation of consumption is well documented to be a period of risk for heavy alcohol users. The first analysis presented here explored heavy drinkers’ drive to consume alcohol, through assessments of ratings for desire and craving for alcohol. Desire was found to potentially be a more relevant marker of yearning for alcohol in this sample of hazardous drinkers, and differential patterns of connectivity were observed in the default mode network (DMN) at higher and lower ratings of desire for alcohol following alcohol abstinence. The second analysis proposed a potential physiological mechanism to underlie differences in psychological responses to abstinence by studying the interaction of the peripheral autonomic nervous system (ANS) and the brain. This analysis found an association between more optimal ANS function and segregated information sharing in the salience network (SN), while less optimal ANS function was associated with more diffuse information spread from the SN. The final analysis presented here explored neurobiological effects of alcohol abstinence across the full brain using functional brain networks, and found abstinence-specific increases in alcohol cue sensitivity in this sample of heavy drinkers. Neurobiological differences were again observed in the DMN and SN, as well as in the sensorimotor and frontotemporal networks. Taken together, these findings suggest that alcohol abstinence in hazardous heavy drinkers may be associated with heterogeneous psychological and physiological responses, marked by segregated brain network organization associated with optimal ANS function that supports the ability to cope with exposure to alcohol-related cues, versus more distributed brain network organization associated with potentially dysfunctional ANS activity that correlates with higher desire for alcohol in response to exposure to cues.

subject

abstinence

alcohol

alcohol cues

autonomic

craving

desire

contributor

Laurienti, Paul J (advisor)

Czoty, Paul (committee member)

McCool, Brian A (committee member)

Veach, Laura J (committee member)

date

2023-09-08T08:35:23Z (accessioned)

2023 (issued)

degree

Neuroscience (discipline)

embargo

2024-09-07 (terms)

2024-09-07 (liftdate)

identifier

http://hdl.handle.net/10339/102611 (uri)

language

en (iso)

publisher

Wake Forest University

type

Dissertation