Measuring Alcohol Expectancies With the Implicit Association Test

Researchers have relied primarily on self-report questionnaires to measure alcohol expectancies. These questionnaires assess explicit expectancies about alcohol but do not provide any measure of the implicit processes that might also play an important role in determining drinking. The implicit assoc...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Psychology of addictive behaviors 2003-06, Vol.17 (2), p.126-133
Main Authors: Jajodia, Archana, Earleywine, Mitchell
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Addictive behaviors
Adult
Adult and adolescent clinical studies
Alcohol Drinking
Alcohol related expectations
Alcohol Use
Alcohol Use Attitudes
Alcoholism
Association
Associative memory
Associative Processes
Attitude Measures
Biological and medical sciences
Expectations
Female
Human
Humans
Implicit beliefs
Male
Medical sciences
Psychological tests
Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry
Psychopathology. Psychiatry
Reaction Time
Selfreport measures
Sensitivity and Specificity
Surveys and Questionnaires
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Summary:Researchers have relied primarily on self-report questionnaires to measure alcohol expectancies. These questionnaires assess explicit expectancies about alcohol but do not provide any measure of the implicit processes that might also play an important role in determining drinking. The implicit association test (IAT; A. G. Greenwald, D. E. McGhee, & L. K. Schwartz, 1998 ), a reaction time task, measures differential associations of 2 target concepts with an attribute. In this study, the IAT provided a measure of the strength of associations of alcohol concepts to positive or negative outcomes in memory. This implicit measure of alcohol expectancies successfully predicted alcohol use in 103 undergraduates. The findings also supported the hypothesis that an implicit measure of expectancy can add to the predictive power of existing questionnaire-based measures.
ISSN:0893-164X
1939-1501
DOI:10.1037/0893-164X.17.2.126