Exploring affect-motivated alcohol use as a value-based decision-making process

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PROJECT SUMMARY/ABSTRACT K99 training: The goal of the proposed K99/R00 Pathway to Independence Award is to provide Dr. Jonas Dora with training needed to launch his career as an independent scientist. Following his PhD in cognitive psychology, Dr. Dora has already started to make important contributions to the field of alcohol use research as a postdoctoral research fellow in the Department of Psychology at the University of Washington. The proposed K99 training period builds on Dr. Dora’s PhD background and his current training in the study of alcohol use in natural environments. The K99 phase will provide a period of intensive training in the combined study of alcohol use with experimental, ecological momentary assessment, and computational approaches, and will position Dr. Dora to make substantial contributions to the field of alcohol research over the course of his career. Dr. Dora will learn from the proposed mentor (Dr. Kevin King), local collaborators (Drs. William George, Mary Larimer) and external collaborators (Drs. Matt Field, James Murphy, Katie Witkiewitz), who are leading experts in the field of alcohol use research using both experimental and ecologically valid approaches, as well as the advanced computational modeling of behavioral and subjective data. In addition, Dr. Dora will attend courses, scientific conferences, and workshops to meet his training objectives. The University of Washington is a world-class research institution that provides an optimal environment, the necessary resources, and a stimulating intellectual space to facilitate successful completion of this project. K99 research: Together with his mentor and collaborators, Dr. Dora will conduct controlled experiments in a simulated bar environment as well as studies in people’s natural drinking environment to test the idea that negative and positive reinforcement of alcohol can be observed when heavy drinkers with and without symptoms of alcohol use disorder (AUD) make decisions between alcohol and substance-free reinforcers. R00 research: Dr. Dora will translate the K99 research using a task involving hypothetical choices between alcohol and substance-free reinforcers into an ecologically valid test of the hypothesis that positive and negative affect differentially motivate real-world value-based decisions to consume alcohol (vs regulate affect via alternative emotion regulation strategies) in heavy drinkers with/without symptoms of AUD in everyday life. Significance: By combining methods from cognitive psychology and alcohol use research, this research will provide a novel test of the idea that alcohol use is reinforcing in the face of positive and negative emotions, and in that way will advance NIAAA’s strategic aim to identify mechanisms that contribute to AUD. By studying alcohol use as a form of value-based decision-making, the insights from this project will suggest new possibilities to target people’s emotions in the prevention and treatment of alcohol use disorder.