Alcohol Effects on Cognitive & Affective Mediation of Women's Decision Making

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DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The proposed project is a competing renewal of RO1AA014512 and will continue a program of research concerned with alcohol?s effects on women?s risk-related decision making. The original project applied a cognitive mediation model to understanding alcohol?s effects, in conjunction with other contextual and background factors, on women?s risk decisions. Alcohol consumption is known to increase risk-related behavior, and decision-making is cognitively and emotionally complex when a person is intoxicated. Understanding in-the-moment processes affecting women?s decisions while intoxicated is critical to informing prevention efforts. The proposed project will examine relationships among alcohol consumption, a partner?s coercion, and women?s risk-related decisions. It will draw on four theoretical lines: 1) the Cognitive Mediation Model (Norris et al., 2004), which examines the extent to which cognitive appraisals mediate the influence of background and situational factors on emotional and risk-related decisions ; 2) Alcohol Myopia Theory (Taylor & Leonard, 1983), which explicates the influence of alcohol-related cognitive impairment on behavior; 3) the Appraisal-Disruption Model (Sayette, 1993), which addresses alcohol?s cognitive impairment effects on emotional responding; and 4) Alcohol Expectancy Theory (Goldman, 1999; MacAndrew & Edgerton, 1969), which describes how alcohol influences behavior through cultural and individual expectations about alcohol?s effects. The proposed research will include a laboratory-based alcohol administration experiment to establish causal connections between manipulated situational factors, including alcohol consumption, and cognitive appraisals, emotional responses, and in-the-moment risk-related decisions. It will also employ a longitudinal survey to examine how in-the-moment decisions translate to actual situations. Structural equation modeling will be used to examine background and situational factors, as well as situationbased cognitive and emotional mediators, as predictors of in-the-moment decisions. Background and situational models will be examined using longitudinal data analytic techniques, including survival analysis, latent transition analysis, and growth curve modeling. Relevance: Alcohol consumption increases the likelihood of risk-related decisions and outcomes. The proposed project will examine this major public health concern by studying the influence of alcohol on women?s decision making in high-risk situations.