Cargando…

On the relationship between emotional state and abnormal unfairness sensitivity in alcohol dependence

Recent empirical findings suggest that alcohol dependence is characterized by heightened sensitivity to unfairness during social transactions. The present study went a step further and aimed to ascertain whether this abnormal level of sensitivity to unfairness is underlined by an increased emotional...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Brevers, Damien, Noël, Xavier, Hanak, Catherine, Verbanck, Paul, Kornreich, Charles
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2015
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4496552/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26217293
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00983
_version_ 1782380423618232320
author Brevers, Damien
Noël, Xavier
Hanak, Catherine
Verbanck, Paul
Kornreich, Charles
author_facet Brevers, Damien
Noël, Xavier
Hanak, Catherine
Verbanck, Paul
Kornreich, Charles
author_sort Brevers, Damien
collection PubMed
description Recent empirical findings suggest that alcohol dependence is characterized by heightened sensitivity to unfairness during social transactions. The present study went a step further and aimed to ascertain whether this abnormal level of sensitivity to unfairness is underlined by an increased emotional reactivity. Twenty-six recently abstinent alcohol-dependent (AD) individuals and 32 controls performed an ultimatum game (UG), in which participants had to respond to take-it-or-leave-it offers, ranging from fair to unfair and made by a fictive proposer. Emotional state was recorded during UG offers presentation and was indexed by the amplitude of skin conductance response (SCR). Results showed that AD decided to reject unfair offers more frequently than their controls, confirming previous data. The proportion of rejected unfair UG offers was correlated with SCR, in the AD but not in the control group. This finding suggests that deciding to accept or reject unfair UG offers is influenced by arousal-affective activity in AD, but not in controls. Heightened emotional reactivity may have driven AD to punish the proposer rather than acting as a rational economic agent. An implication of present findings is that AD might have difficult to cope with unfair situations triggered by social interactions. Future studies are needed in order to examine whether—emotional and behavioral—reactivity to unfairness during the UG could impact alcohol consumption and relapse in AD.
format Online
Article
Text
id pubmed-4496552
institution National Center for Biotechnology Information
language English
publishDate 2015
publisher Frontiers Media S.A.
record_format MEDLINE/PubMed
spelling pubmed-44965522015-07-27 On the relationship between emotional state and abnormal unfairness sensitivity in alcohol dependence Brevers, Damien Noël, Xavier Hanak, Catherine Verbanck, Paul Kornreich, Charles Front Psychol Psychology Recent empirical findings suggest that alcohol dependence is characterized by heightened sensitivity to unfairness during social transactions. The present study went a step further and aimed to ascertain whether this abnormal level of sensitivity to unfairness is underlined by an increased emotional reactivity. Twenty-six recently abstinent alcohol-dependent (AD) individuals and 32 controls performed an ultimatum game (UG), in which participants had to respond to take-it-or-leave-it offers, ranging from fair to unfair and made by a fictive proposer. Emotional state was recorded during UG offers presentation and was indexed by the amplitude of skin conductance response (SCR). Results showed that AD decided to reject unfair offers more frequently than their controls, confirming previous data. The proportion of rejected unfair UG offers was correlated with SCR, in the AD but not in the control group. This finding suggests that deciding to accept or reject unfair UG offers is influenced by arousal-affective activity in AD, but not in controls. Heightened emotional reactivity may have driven AD to punish the proposer rather than acting as a rational economic agent. An implication of present findings is that AD might have difficult to cope with unfair situations triggered by social interactions. Future studies are needed in order to examine whether—emotional and behavioral—reactivity to unfairness during the UG could impact alcohol consumption and relapse in AD. Frontiers Media S.A. 2015-07-09 /pmc/articles/PMC4496552/ /pubmed/26217293 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00983 Text en Copyright © 2015 Brevers, Noël, Hanak, Verbanck and Kornreich. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Psychology
Brevers, Damien
Noël, Xavier
Hanak, Catherine
Verbanck, Paul
Kornreich, Charles
On the relationship between emotional state and abnormal unfairness sensitivity in alcohol dependence
title On the relationship between emotional state and abnormal unfairness sensitivity in alcohol dependence
title_full On the relationship between emotional state and abnormal unfairness sensitivity in alcohol dependence
title_fullStr On the relationship between emotional state and abnormal unfairness sensitivity in alcohol dependence
title_full_unstemmed On the relationship between emotional state and abnormal unfairness sensitivity in alcohol dependence
title_short On the relationship between emotional state and abnormal unfairness sensitivity in alcohol dependence
title_sort on the relationship between emotional state and abnormal unfairness sensitivity in alcohol dependence
topic Psychology
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4496552/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26217293
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00983
work_keys_str_mv AT breversdamien ontherelationshipbetweenemotionalstateandabnormalunfairnesssensitivityinalcoholdependence
AT noelxavier ontherelationshipbetweenemotionalstateandabnormalunfairnesssensitivityinalcoholdependence
AT hanakcatherine ontherelationshipbetweenemotionalstateandabnormalunfairnesssensitivityinalcoholdependence
AT verbanckpaul ontherelationshipbetweenemotionalstateandabnormalunfairnesssensitivityinalcoholdependence
AT kornreichcharles ontherelationshipbetweenemotionalstateandabnormalunfairnesssensitivityinalcoholdependence