Behavioral addictions

BACKGROUND: Disability is associated with alcohol misuse and drug overdose death, however, its association with alcohol-induced death remains understudied. OBJECTIVE: To quantify the risk of alcohol-induced death among adults with different types of disabilities in a nationally representative longitudinal sample of US adults. METHODS: Persons with disabilities were identified among participants ages 18 or older in the Mortality Disparities in American Communities (MDAC) study ( n  = 3,324,000)...

Introduction : Research indicates that take-home naloxone (THN) is saving lives across rural Appalachia, but whether it also results in treatment for opioid use disorders (OUDs) remains unclear. This study involves a detailed qualitative analysis of interviews with 16 individuals who had overdosed on opioids 61 times to understand why a THN intervention does not routinely lead to OUD treatment. Methods : This study builds upon a one-year (2018) qualitative study on community responses to opioid overdose fatalities in four adjacent rural counties in Western Pennsylvania...

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: Internet addiction (IA) has been identified as a major public health problem that is more prominent in adolescents and young adults. Some researchers have indicated certain advantages of family-based therapy over other treatments in participants with IA, but no conclusive evaluation has been reported. The present meta-analysis aims to review the efficacy of family-based therapy on Internet addiction in adolescents and young adults. METHODS: Relevant articles published from 1996 to February 15th, 2024, were searched from 14 databases, including three Chinese databases...

BACKGROUND: Although internet gaming disorder (IGD) has been included in the DSM-5 for approximately 10 years, debate remains regarding its existence and classification. METHODS: The current research incorporated three approaches. First, implicit association tests were used to examine for potential dissociation between wanting and liking in IGD. Second, brain features in wanting and liking circuits were tested and compared with tobacco use disorder (TUD) when performing a cue-craving task to explore the neural features of wanting and liking...

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: Celebrity worship, defined as an excessive admiration towards celebrities, has generated considerable research and public interest. A widely used assessment instrument to measure celebrity worship is the 23-item Celebrity Attitude Scale. However, concerns have been raised regarding the measurement, including the inconsistent factor structure and lack of a cut-off point to identify "celebrity worshipers". The present study aims to address these concerns by testing the psychometric appropriateness of a short, 7-item version of the CAS (i...

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: Problematic smartphone use (PSU) has gained attention, but its definition remains debated. This study aimed to develop and validate a new scale measuring PSU-the Smartphone Use Problems Identification Questionnaire (SUPIQ). METHODS: Using two separate samples, a university community sample (N = 292) and a general population sample (N = 397), we investigated: (1) the construct validity of the SUPIQ through exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses; (2) the convergent validity of the SUPIQ with correlation analyses and the visualized partial correlation network analyses; (3) the psychometric equivalence of the SUPIQ across two samples through multigroup confirmatory factor analyses; (4) the explanatory power of the SUPIQ over the Short Version of Smartphone Addiction Scale (SAS-SV) with hierarchical multiple regressions...

OBJECTIVE: Most individuals attending detoxification clinics do not pursue subsequent treatment. Earlier research has suggested that emerging technologies like mHealth interventions could address the postdetoxification treatment gap, yet it remains unclear whether patients themselves endorse such approaches. Our study aimed to qualitatively explore perceived treatment barriers and assessed potential of mHealth among individuals who have undergone alcohol detoxification. METHOD: We conducted a single-interview-per-participant qualitative study, sampling participants ( n = 23) that had visited the Stockholm substance use disorder emergency department for alcohol-related reasons, of whom n = 8 were purposively included due to having missed their scheduled follow-up outpatient appointment...

OBJECTIVE: Co-use of tobacco and cannabis may be prevalent in pregnancy, potentially leading to additional adverse health outcomes. Utilizing a national sample of women followed prospectively before, during, and after pregnancy, this study tested whether prepregnancy co-use of tobacco and cannabis (vs. tobacco-only use and cannabis-only use) was associated with greater likelihood of continuing to use tobacco and/or cannabis during pregnancy and postpartum. METHOD: Data were drawn from Waves 1-5 (2013-2019) of the Population Assessment of Tobacco and Health (PATH) Study...

OBJECTIVE: Social network analysis (SNA) characterizes the structure and composition of a person's social relationships. Network features have been associated with alcohol consumption in observational studies, primarily of university undergraduates. No studies have investigated whether indicators from a person's social network can accurately identify the presence of alcohol use disorder (AUD), offering an indirect strategy for identifying AUD. METHOD: Two cross-sectional case-control designs examined the clinical utility of social network indicators for identifying individuals with AUD (cases) versus demographically matched drinkers without AUD (controls)...

Research on online pornography abstinence movements has predominantly focused on men's perspectives, often within the context of the broader manosphere. This focus has overshadowed the unique experiences and viewpoints of women in these movements. Our study aimed to fill this gap by exploring women-centric perspectives in pornography abstinence forums, particularly Porn Free Women (r/pornfreewomen). Using a mixed methods approach, this study examined the sexual scripts presented in women-dominated pornography abstinence communities...

Excessive gaming can impair both mental and physical health, drawing widespread public and clinical attention, especially among young generations. People are now more exposed to gaming-related content on social media than before, and this exposure may have a significant impact on their behavior. However, the neural mechanisms underlying this effect remain unexplored. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), this study aimed to investigate the neural activity induced by gaming-related content on social media among young adults casually playing online games...

INTRODUCTION: With the inclusion of gaming disorder in the ICD-11, diagnostic criteria were introduced for this relatively new disorder. These criteria may be applied to other potential specific Internet-use disorders. The 11-item Assessment of Criteria for Specific Internet-use Disorders (ACSID-11) was developed for consistent screening of gaming disorder, online buying-shopping disorder, online pornography-use disorder, social networks-use disorder, and online gambling disorder. This study tested the construct validity of the ACSID-11, including convergent and divergent measures...

Many studies have explored the association between adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and Internet addiction (IA), yet the research findings on the association between them are inconclusive. We conducted a systematic search on 7 databases to identify the relevant studies published until January 2023, and analyzed the findings from 37 studies across 12 countries involving 45,364 participants aged 8 to 67 years (51 % women). Results indicated a positive correlation (r = 0.21) was found between ACE and IA around the world, which differed among continents...

RATIONALE: Corticotropin-releasing factor (CRF), the apical stress-inducing hormone, exacerbates stress and addictive behaviors. TCAP-1 is a peptide that directly inhibits both CRF-mediated stress and addiction-related behaviors; however, the direct action of TCAP-1 on morphine withdrawal-associated behaviors has not previously been examined. OBJECTIVE: To determine whether TCAP-1 administration attenuates behavioral and physiological consequences of morphine withdrawal in mice...

Adolescence is a developmental phase that exposes young people to exploratory behaviors, including substance abuse. In Switzerland, recreational ketamine use among young people is on the rise and is likely to lead to irreversible somatic complications. Primary care physicians play an essential role in identifying ketamine users, and should offer brief interventions, risk-reduction advice and a psychosocial assessment of the situation, involving close relatives. In the event of secondary damage, particularly urological damage, coordinated management by specialists is essential to achieve symptom regression...

OBJECTIVE: Decades of research has found support for the motivational model of alcohol use at the between-person level, yet research on event-level drinking motives is in its nascent stage. Similarly, drinking context has been largely ignored in studies of day-level motives. Therefore, the present study sought to test whether drinking context mediates the relation between affect and motivation on drinking outcomes at both day and person levels. METHOD: Emerging adults who drank in solitary and social settings ( N = 107; 61...

Background: The stigma and discrimination experienced by individuals with an alcohol/substance use disorder often extends to the family members and friends who provide care, which is known as courtesy stigma. This courtesy stigma can lead to isolation, poor mental health and might impact the quality-of-care these individuals provide. The aim of this study was to examine the frequency of experienced courtesy stigma/discrimination in individuals in a family support service for a loved one's substance use, and to examine any cross-sectional associations with changes in mood, health- and social-related outcomes...

Multiple diagnoses are the rule in Mental Health and alcohol use disorder (AUD) is a psychopathology with many comorbidities, requiring interventions that consider common factors, which means using a transdiagnostic perspective. This study aimed to identify in the scientific literature the main common transdiagnostic factors that link AUD to other psychopathologies in people over 18 years of age. A systematic review of the literature was carried out in the portals of the databases Pubmed, PsychINFO and CAPES...

BACKGROUND: The nucleus accumbens (NAc) is a key node of the brain reward circuit driving reward-related behavior. Dysregulation of NAc has been demonstrated to contribute to pathological markers of addiction in substance use disorder (SUD) making it a potential therapeutic target for brain stimulation. Transcranial focused ultrasound (tFUS) is an emerging non-invasive brain stimulation approach that can modulate deep brain regions with a high spatial resolution. However, there is currently no evidence showing how the brain activity of NAc and brain functional connectivity within the reward network neuromodulated by tFUS on the NAc...

Background : Prior research has discovered an association between vaping activities and increased delinquent behaviors. However, this relationship has been exclusively studied among adolescents and has not been examined among an adult sample. Methods : The current study uses a nationally representative sample of approximately 45,000 adults from the 2021 National Survey on Drug Use and Health. Logistic regression and negative binomial regression are employed to assess the association between three types of vaping (marijuana, nicotine, flavor) and five crime measures (arrest, sold drugs, stole >$50, attack, crime index), net of covariates...