A flicker paradigm for inducing change blindness reveals alcohol and cannabis information processing biases in heavier but not lighter social users

Jones, B.T., Jones, B.C. , Smith, H. and Copley, N. (2003) A flicker paradigm for inducing change blindness reveals alcohol and cannabis information processing biases in heavier but not lighter social users. Addiction, 98(2), pp. 235-244.

Abstract

<p>AIM: To apply a new paradigm using transient changes to visual scenes to explore information processing biases relating to `social' levels of alcohol and cannabis use.</p> <p>PARTICIPANTS: Male and female student volunteers (n = 200) not self-reporting substance-related problems.</p> <p>SETTING: Quiet testing areas throughout the university campus.</p> <p>DESIGN: A flicker paradigm, for inducing change blindness with lighter and heavier social users of alcohol (experiment 1, n= 100) and social users and non-users of cannabis (experiment 2, n= 100), explored the associations between habitual level of use and the latency to detection of a single substance-related or neutral change made to a scene of grouped substance-related and neutral objects.</p> <p>MEASUREMENTS: Alcohol use was measured as the number of units of the heaviest drinking day from the previous week; cannabis use as the number of months of use in previous 12. Change detection latency comparisons were used to evaluate processing biases. FINDINGS: In both experiments, (i) heavier social users detected substance-related changes quicker than lighter and non-users; (ii) lighter and non-users detected substance-neutral changes quicker than heavier users; (iii) heavier social users detected substance-related quicker than substance-neutral changes; and (iv) lighter and non-users detected substance-neutral changes quicker than substance-related changes. </p> <p>CONCLUSIONS: Alcohol and cannabis processing biases are found at levels of social use, have the potential to influence future consumption and for this reason merit further research.</p>

• Item Type: Articles
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Jones, Professor Benedict
• Authors: Jones, B.T., Jones, B.C., Smith, H., and Copley, N.
• College/School: College of Medical Veterinary and Life Sciences > School of Psychology & Neuroscience
• Journal Name: Addiction
• Publisher: Blackwell Publishing
• ISSN: 0965-2140