Journal of Behavioral Addictions最新文献

Background and aims: The shift from goal-directed to habitual control is a well-documented phenomenon in addiction research and is considered a critical factor in the development and maintenance of addictive behaviors. Whether Internet Gaming Disorder (IGD) is also associated with such a shift is not yet clear. The current study investigated the imbalance between goal-directed and habitual control in individuals with IGD.

Methods: Goal-directed and habitual control, as informed by model-based (MB) and model-free (MF) learning, were assessed with a two-step sequential decision-making task during functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) in 33 young adults with IGD and 32 healthy controls (HCs). Self-report data regarding addictive symptoms, game craving, and impulsivity were also collected.

Results: Individuals with IGD relied more heavily on habitual control to guide subsequent choices compared to HCs. According to a hybrid reinforcement learning model, individuals with IGD also exhibited a reduced MB weight related to HCs, which was correlated with more severe addictive symptoms. fMRI results revealed that individuals with IGD showed increased MF reward prediction error (RPEMF) signals in the right triangular part of the inferior frontal gyrus (IFG). No significant group differences were found in the contrast of RPEMB maps.

Discussion and conclusions: Our study provides both behavioral and neural evidence highlighting an imbalance between goal-directed and habitual control, favoring habitual control in individuals with IGD. This imbalance is associated with the severity of addictive symptoms, suggesting an indication of habit inclination in IGD could potentially contribute to the development or maintenance of the addiction.

Background and aims: With surges in digital technologies, concerns over adolescents' screen use have intensified. Previous studies often relied on self-reported screen time, neglecting the experiential and motivational aspects of different screen activities (e.g. social media, gaming, and smartphones), possibly leading to heterogeneous associations. This study aimed to examine whether the severity of problematic screen use, conceptualized as a continuous measure of screen-related functional impairment, plays a more central role in development than self-reported screen time or phone-checking frequency, and to explore its influence within the broader adolescent ecosystem (i.e. family conflict, peer involvement, and school participation).

Methods: Cohort data were obtained from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) study Release 5.1. Screen use was obtained from self-report questionnaires, capturing both activity time and functional impairments. Among cross-sectional networks derived from 9,054 youth (4,272 girls, 47.18%) at 2-year follow-up (T2, ages 11-12 years) and 4,007 youth (1,896 girls, 47.32%) at 4-year follow-up (T4, ages 13-14 years), problematic use showed higher centrality than screen time and checking behavior, owing to stronger connections with behavioral tendencies. Cross-lagged-panel-network analyses of problematic use included 3,954 youth (1,863 girls, 47.12%).

Results: Problematic use exhibited high out-strength, which was associated with worsening psychopathologies and environmental conditions. Conversely, problematic use at T4 appeared less influenced by factors at T2.

Conclusion: This study underscores the pivotal role of problematic screen use, which showed greater centrality and stronger predictive effects on adolescent well-being than self-reported screen time, highlighting the need for policies and interventions addressing screen-related functional impairments to promote healthier screen habits in developing youth.

Background and aims: Online shopping has become a primary form of consumption in daily life, inevitably accompanied by the emergence of problematic online shopping. Attentional bias towards online shopping cues influences individuals' online shopping behavior. This study examined attentional bias mechanisms in problematic online shoppers using two experiments.

Methods: This study combines the dot-probe task and eye-tracking technology to explore attentional bias and temporal dynamics toward shopping-related cues among problematic online shoppers. Experiment 1 recruited 84 participants to investigate attentional bias toward proximal cues, while Experiment 2 recruited 76 participants to examine attentional bias toward distal cues.

Results: The results of Experiment 1 showed that both problematic online shoppers and control individuals exhibited shorter first fixation latency, longer gaze duration, and total fixation duration toward proximal cues. And only problematic online shoppers exhibited slower first exit saccade velocity and average exit saccade velocity. The results of Experiment 2 indicated that problematic online shoppers exhibited longer gaze duration and total fixation duration, as well as faster first entry saccade velocity toward distal cues.

Discussion and conclusions: In summary, problematic online shoppers exhibit similar attentional bias toward both shopping proximal and distal cues, which are presented as the vigilance-maintenance pattern. For problematic online shoppers, distal cues have gradually acquired incentive value comparable to that of proximal cues. However, it should be noted that control individuals also exhibited attentional bias toward proximal cues.

Background and aims: Researchers have suggested that subtypes of problematic social media use (PSMU) should be identified for purposes of prevention and intervention. However, most studies have overlooked the heterogeneous characteristics of PSMU trajectories, and no research has systematically examined which interpersonal factors could predict these trajectories. In the present study, we identified classes of developmental trajectories of PSMU and examined differences across classes in adolescents' interpersonal functioning in family, school, and peer contexts.

Methods: Participants were 357 Chinese adolescents enrolled in two middle schools in China (52.1% girls, aged 12-15 years). The students completed questionnaires in their classrooms over the course of one year in a three-wave longitudinal study.

Results: Latent growth mixture modeling (LGMM) revealed three developmental trajectory classes of PSMU based on the intercepts and slopes of PSMU scores over time: high risk-gradual increase group (37%), low risk-sharp increase group (39%), and low risk-stable group (24%). Parent-adolescent attachment (family context), teacher-student relationships (school context), and deviant peer affiliation (peer context) were associated with variations in developmental trajectories.

Conclusions: The findings can inform the design of prevention and intervention programs for specific subgroups of adolescents who show problematic social media use.

Background and aims: Sexual craving and the alleviation of negative emotions are fundamental driving forces underlying problematic pornography use (PPU). In healthy individuals, these processes can be effectively attenuated through cognitive strategies mediated by the prefrontal cortex. However, PPU is associated with impaired cognitive control functions. This study aimed to investigate whether transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) targeting the right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC) could enhance the regulation of craving and negative emotions in individuals at risk for PPU.

Methods: A randomized, within-subject, placebo-controlled design was used, in which 45 male individuals at risk for PPU (mean age = 20.18 years, SD = 1.03) received both active (2.5 mA for 20 min) and sham tDCS to the right DLPFC, with sessions separated by one week. During tDCS, participants at risk for PPU performed the regulation of craving (ROC) task, comparing cue-induced craving with instructed regulation, and the emotion regulation (ER) task, contrasting negative affect with instructed regulation. Subjective ratings of craving and negative emotions were collected for each trial.

Results: Our results demonstrated that individuals at risk for PPU effectively regulated their craving and negative affect when guided to use cognitive strategies. Furthermore, anodal tDCS of the right dlPFC during the craving regulation condition significantly reduced craving ratings compared to sham stimulation. However, no facilitative effect of right dlPFC anodal tDCS on ER was observed.

Discussion and conclusions: These findings highlight the potential of tDCS as a novel therapeutic intervention for individuals with PPU, offering the first experimental evidence to support its effectiveness in reducing craving.

Background and aims: Scientific evidence for underpinning mechanisms of Compulsive Sexual Behavior Disorder (CSBD) is still scarce. This study explores impaired sexual delay discounting in compulsive sexual behavior (CSB) and its relationship with sexual sensation seeking (SSS) and borderline personality disorder (BPD) features in a general population sample.

Methods: Data were collected via an online survey in a German convenience sample. Participants (n = 311; 71.3% women, 27.3% men, 1.6% gender-diverse individuals) completed the Sexual Delay Discounting Task (SDT), Compulsive Sexual Behavior Disorder Scale-19 (CSBD-19), Sexual Sensation Seeking Scale (SSS scale), and Borderline Symptom List-23 (BSL-23).

Results: Higher CSB and SSS were linked to greater sexual delay discounting and a lower preference for condom or dental dam use, particularly in women. BPD features were associated with higher levels of CSB and SSS but did not moderate the relationship between these behaviors and sexual delay discounting. Men exhibited significantly more symptoms of CSB and SSS than women.

Discussion and conclusions: The findings contribute to our understanding of CSB, especially in women, and suggest a relationship between sexual delay discounting, SSS and CSB. This finding suggests a need for gender-sensitive approaches and awareness of excitement seeking behavior in research and clinical interventions for CSB.

Background and aims: The evidence concerning the relationships between loneliness, gambling to escape, and problem gambling is mixed. This study aimed to investigate how loneliness relates to gambling to escape and gambling problems using a longitudinal approach.

Method: This population-based, longitudinal study included five time points, with data having been collected between April 2021 (T1) and April-May 2023 (T5). Participants were 18-75-year-old Finnish residents. Only those who had taken part in the study at each time point (T1-T5) and had gambled at least once a month at some point in the follow-up period were included in the study (n = 612; 54.58% male; Mage = 51.85 years). Loneliness was measured with the UCLA 3-Item Loneliness Scale, and gambling to escape was measured with three questions concerning negative escapism taken from the Motivations to Play Inventory. Problem gambling was measured using the Problem Gambling Severity Index (PGSI). Random intercept cross-lagged panel modeling was used to analyze the relationships.

Results: Gambling problems predicted future loneliness on a within-person level, but loneliness did not predict future gambling problems. Also, gambling to escape predicted future gambling problems on a within-person level. On a between-person level, loneliness, gambling to escape and gambling problems were positively correlated.

Discussion and conclusion: Gambling problems may predispose individuals to future loneliness. However, the relatively small effects observed indicate that individual differences play a significant role in this regard.

Background and aims: Problematic social media use (PSMU), a potential behavioral addiction, has become a worldwide mental health concern. An imbalanced interaction between Pavlovian and instrumental learning systems has been proposed to be central to addiction. However, it remains unclear whether individuals with PSMU also over-rely on the Pavlovian system when flexible instrumental learning is required.

Methods: To address this question, we used an orthogonalized go/no-go task that distinguished two axes of behavioral control during associative learning: valence (reward or punishment) and action (approach or avoidance). We compared the learning performance of 33 individuals with PSMU and 32 regular social media users in this task. Moreover, latent cognitive factors involved in this task, such as learning rate and reward sensitivity, were estimated using a computational modeling approach.

Results: The PSMU group showed worse learning performance when Pavlovian and instrumental systems were incongruent in the reward, but not the punishment, domain. Computational modeling results showed a higher learning rate and lower reward sensitivity in the PSMU group than in the control group.

Conclusions: This study elucidated the computational mechanisms underlying suboptimal instrumental learning in individuals with PSMU. These findings not only highlight the potential of computational modeling to advance our understanding of PSMU, but also shed new light on the development of effective interventions for this disorder.

Background: Existing research on facial emotion processing in Internet gaming disorder (IGD) has focused on single facial expression but little is known about crowd facial emotion (present multiple facial expressions simultaneously) ensemble coding. Thus, this event-related potential (ERP) study aimed to investigate temporal dynamics of crowd facial emotion ensemble coding under interference in IGD.

Methods: 17 IGD and 17 control group (CG) participants completed a task of extracting mean emotion from crowd facial expressions under emotional interference while electroencephalographic activity was recorded.

Results: The N170 amplitudes elicited by crowd facial expressions in IGD were significantly smaller than in CG. Angry crowd faces evoked larger N170 amplitudes than happy crowd faces in IGD. Happy crowd faces elicited more negative early posterior negativity (EPN) amplitudes than angry crowd faces in CG, while no difference was found in IGD. In the later ensemble coding stage, we found a significant three-way interaction between the group, emotional valence and interference in the frontal negative slow wave component.

Conclusions: IGD participants exhibited weaker ensemble coding ability of crowd facial expressions. They showed an automatic processing bias towards angry crowd faces in the early stage, as well as insensitivity to happy crowd faces in the subsequent selective processing stage during mean emotion extraction. In the later stage, IGD participants failed to actively adopt appropriate cognitive strategies to inhibit interference. This study first provided electrophysiological evidence for the characteristics of crowd facial emotion ensemble coding in IGD and contributed to clarifying how IGD affects social cognition.

Aim: Exercise addiction is a compulsive need to engage in physical activity despite potential negative consequences. This study aims to analyze adolescents' psychosocial health in relation to the risk of exercise addiction, focusing on competition levels, sport types, gender, and age.

Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted with 7,596 participants (44.2% girls) aged 11-19. Data on physical activity (PAQ-C and PAQ-A), sleep quality (PSQI), anxiety (SAS), depression symptoms (BDI-II), eating disorders (EDI-3), and health-related quality of life (KIDSCREEN-52) were collected via validated questionnaires. The prevalence of exercise addiction risk (EAI) was assessed, and differences based on competition level, sport type, gender, and age were analyzed. Gamma GLMs factors-adjusted were used for statistical comparisons.

Results: 6.4% of adolescents in non-competitive sports and 15.6% in competitive sports showed a risk of exercise addiction. The risk was higher in boys, but the difference diminished at higher competition levels. The risk of addiction increased notably in late adolescence. Competitive athletes, especially at high levels, were at greater risk compared to noncompetitive athletes. Those in individual sports were at higher risk than those in team sports. Adolescents at risk of exercise addiction reported poorer mental health, including sleep quality (β = 1.62, p < 0.001), anxiety (β = 3.58, p < 0.001), depression (β = 2.283, p < 0.001), and eating disorders (β = 3.101, p < 0.001).

Conclusions: Exercise addiction is a significant concern among adolescents, especially in competitive and individual sports. It is associated with poorer mental health outcomes, emphasizing the need for targeted interventions to reduce the risk of addiction and promote holistic health in adolescent athletes.