An Experimental Investigation Into the Effect of Negative Affect on the Behavioral Economic Demand for Alcohol

Objective: It is hypothesized that alcohol use is reinforcing when used as a strategy to cope with negative affect. Although the evidence for this hypothesis in observational data is weak, some experimental evidence suggests that the behavioral economic demand for alcohol increases immediately following a negative emotional event. We hypothesized that people show a higher demand for alcohol following negative (vs. neutral) mood inductions and that this effect is stronger in people who report heavier drinking compared to people who report lighter drinking as well as stronger on days characterized by higher coping motives and negative urgency. Method: 309 college students who reported recent alcohol consumption (M-AUDIT = 6.86) completed the alcohol purchase task after being subjected to 12 mood inductions (six negative, six neutral, order randomized) on 12 separate days. Results: In our preregistered analyses, we found no evidence that the behavioral economic demand for alcohol was elevated following negative mood inductions. The mood inductions in our study were not as strong as has been reported in previous research, weakening the preregistered inferences. In exploratory analyses performed on a subset of the data in which the mood inductions worked as intended, demand was higher following negative mood inductions. Conclusions: The results of this study are not conclusive. In light of previous research, we consider these data to slightly increase our confidence that demand for alcohol is increased immediately following a negative emotional event.