Altered oscillatory brain dynamics of emotional processing in young binge drinkers

• Published in: Cognitive, affective, & behavioral neuroscience affective, & behavioral neuroscience, 2018-02, Vol.18 (1), p.43-57
• Main Authors: Huang, Siyuan, Holcomb, Lee A., Cruz, Stephen M., Marinkovic, Ksenija
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Alcohol use; Alcoholism; Anxiety; Behavioral Science and Psychology; Cognitive ability; Cognitive Psychology; Cortex; Drinking behavior; Drunkenness; EEG; Electroencephalography; Emotions; Neurosciences; Psychology; Theta rhythms
• ISSN: 1530-7026; 1531-135X
• DOI: 10.3758/s13415-017-0551-7

Heavy episodic drinking, also termed binge drinking, is commonly practiced by young adults. It is accompanied by a range of cognitive, affective, and social problems, but the neural dynamics underlying changes in emotional functions is poorly understood. To investigate the behavioral and brain indices of affective processing as a function of binge drinking, young, healthy participants (23.3 ± 3.3 years) were assigned to two groups ( n = 32 each) based on their drinking habits. Binge drinking (BD) participants reported drinking heavily with at least five binge episodes in the last 6 months, whereas light drinkers (LD) reported no more than one binge episode in the last 6 months. Participants provided subjective ratings of emotionally evocative images with negative, positive, erotic, and neutral themes mostly selected from the International Affective Picture System (IAPS). Electroencephalography (EEG) signal was recorded with a 64-channel system and analyzed in theta frequency band (4–7 Hz) with Morlet wavelets. Subjective ratings of the IAPS pictures were equivalent across both groups. However, affective modulation of event-related theta power both during early appraisal and later integrative processing stages was attenuated in BD, particularly those engaging in high-intensity drinking. These findings suggest that binge drinking is associated with altered neurophysiological indices of affective functions that are reflected in lower theta responsivity to emotions. The blunted long-range cortico-cortical and corticolimbic integration is consistent with compromised affective functions in alcohol use disorder. These findings may have implications for diagnostic and intervention strategies in heavy alcohol users.