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Biomedical subjects

W H George

Publications and source records attributed to W H George.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed2000

Alcohol expectancies and sexuality: a self-fulfilling prophecy analysis of dyadic perceptions and behavior.

OBJECTIVE: We evaluated the self-fulfilling prophecy hypothesis that belief in an "alcohol enhances/stimulates sex" expectancy fosters heightened sexual behavior-via effects on intermediate sexual perceptions. To test this notion, we investigated the effects of self-reported alcohol expectancies, alcohol expectancy set and a co-participant's gender and apparent drinking status on dyadic viewing of erotica. METHOD: Sex-related alcohol expectancies were assessed in 100 male moderate social drinkers. In a subsequent session, participants were led to believe they were consuming either alcoholic or nonalcoholic drinks. No alcohol was actually administered. Each participant rated his sexual arousal, rated an alcohol-drinking or nondrinking co-participant on sexual disinhibition and then viewed erotic slides with the co-participant. Slide viewing times were assessed unobtrusively. RESULTS: Path analysis revealed support for the self-fulfilling prophecy hypothesis: Expectancy score (moderated by alcohol expectancy set) heightened viewing indirectly via effects on sexual arousal (beta = .26) and perceived disinhibition (beta = .25). Sexual arousal in turn predicted perceived disinhibition (beta = .37), which in turn predicted viewing (beta = .23). Co-participant drinking had direct (beta = .21) and indirect (beta = .40 via perceived disinhibition) effects on viewing. CONCLUSIONS: Alcohol expectancy variables-apart from alcohol-interactively determined men's responding in a dyadic sexual situation. Consistent with psychosocial formulations, predrinking expectancy steered postdrinking perceptions along an expectancy-congruent course to shape subsequent behavior. Thus, alcohol's role in stimulating men's sexual responding cannot be construed as occurring through a strictly pharmacological mechanism. Speculations about the comparative domains of expectancy versus alcohol explanations are discussed.

Adult↗
PubMed2000

Understanding acute alcohol effects on sexual behavior.

Alcohol has been implicated as having a causal role in a variety of sexual processes and outcomes. We review nonexperimental research illustrating the nature of alcohol's association with sexuality. Methodological considerations limiting causal assertions permissible with nonexperimental data are discussed. We also review findings from experiments, mostly analogue paradigms, examining the effects of alcohol on genital arousal, sexual risk taking, and sexual assault. In each case, it is observed that alcohol can exert a causal effect on one or more of the constituent responses undergirding these phenomena. We conclude that alcohol does appear to have a causal impact on many sexuality indices studied in laboratory conditions. Both alcohol expectancy and alcohol myopia models have been applied to explain these causal linkages. Expectancy models seem to account well for postdrinking sexual reactions and perceptions. Overall, myopia analyses seem to offer the most persuasive explanations of postdrinking expressions of sexual risk taking and sexual assault.

Acute Disease↗
PubMed1995

A revised Alcohol Expectancy Questionnaire: factor structure confirmation, and invariance in a general population sample.

OBJECTIVE: The alcohol expectancy construct has become prominent in contemporary psychosocial approaches to understanding alcohol use and abuse. In 1980 Brown and colleagues developed the 90-item Alcohol Expectancy Questionnaire (AEQ) to assess experiences. Rohsenow modified this instrument to create the 40-item Alcohol Effects Questionnaire (AEQ-2). In the present study, we replaced the dichotomous response format of the AEQ-2 with a six-point scale to create the AEQ-3. The purpose of the study was to evaluate the AEQ-3 for factor structure confirmation and invariance across gender and race subgroups. METHOD: We administered the AEQ-3 to a large general population sample (N = 1,260). The instrument was self-administered during a structured interview. RESULTS: Confirmatory factor analyses were conducted to test a correlated eight-factor model consisting of six positive expectancies and two negative expectancies. Fit indices revealed that the eight-factor model fit the data moderately well. Furthermore, the fit of the eight-factor model was largely invariant across race and gender subgroups. Nonetheless, factor intercorrelations and modification indices revealed inadequate discriminant validity. CONCLUSIONS: Based on these findings, we cautiously recommend the AEQ-3 as a measure of alcohol expectancies. Specific recommendations and limitations are discussed regarding future use of the AEQ-3.

Adult↗
PubMed1992

Resistance to alcohol impairment of visual-motor performance: does it help to pay attention?

In a 2 x 2 factorial design, moderately intoxicated (BAC = .05) college students (n = 40) were exposed to a cognitive set (to concentrate) and/or an auditory feedback signal while performing a modified pursuit-rotor task across five postbeverage trials. Self-reported "highness" was also assessed. A control group received placebo drinks and performed without aids. Hypothesized main effects for both set and signal revealed that intoxicated aided subjects outperformed their unaided counterparts. Moreover, subjects who received both aids outperformed all other intoxicated subjects and performed equivalently with unaided placebo subjects. Separate analyses of the first postbeverage trial and use of covariance analyses provided confidence that the obtained effects were not attributable to acute or chronic tolerance. Highness correlated negatively with performance; but set and signal effects on highness failed to reach significance. Although alcohol-induced motor impairment is not recognized in the research literature as being under volitional control, subjects in the present study exhibited clear resistance to alcohol impairment. Possible psychological mediators and moderators of the obtained effects are discussed, as well as the relevance of these findings for tolerance research. Practical implications are also considered.

Adult↗
PubMed1990

Resistance to alcohol impairment of visual-motor performance. II: Effects for attentional set and self-reported concentration.

There has been little or no direct inquiry into the feasibility of nonbiological processes for attenuating alcohol effects. In an initial study, we found that an instructional Set (to concentrate) presented at each trial facilitated visual-motor performance among moderately intoxicated subjects. We extended this work in the present study by varying density of the Set presentation across trials, by varying Set onset and offset, and by assessing self-reported concentration levels. After dosing, subjects participated in two pairs of performance trials separated by a rest period. Six groups of subjects differed with respect to the number and sequence of Set presentations received across the postbeverage trials. We found that more Set presentations yielded better performance. Also, onset of Set presentation led to improved or sustained performance, whereas offset led to diminished performance. Finally, consistent with the possibility that concentration serves as a mediating variable, self-reported concentration correlated with performance. Implications of the obtained effects are discussed in the context of tolerance research and practical considerations.

Adult↗
PubMed1989

Alcohol and human sexuality: review and integration.

Summarizes physiological findings and reviews the psychological experimental literature investigating the relationship between alcohol and human sexuality. Specifically, the authors attempt to reconcile the apparent contradictions found in the effects of alcohol on male and female sexual responding. The review concludes (a) that alcohol disinhibits psychological sexual arousal and suppresses physiological responding, the former effect being stronger at lower doses of alcohol and the latter effect at higher doses; (b) that although suppression is strictly pharmacological in nature, disinhibition appears to be both pharmacological (the result of cognitive impairment) and psychological (the result of socially learned expectancies); and (c) that expectancies and cognitive impairment can disinhibit separately or jointly.

Alcohol Drinking↗
PubMed1989

Alcohol expectancy and the relationship between drinking and physical aggression.

This study investigated the role of alcohol expectancy as a moderator of the relationship between drinking habits and self-reported frequency of physical aggression. Questionnaires were administered to a sample of 114 American male college students. After controlling for the subjects' ages, hostility, and attitude toward aggression, the relationship between drinking habits and frequency of physical aggression was significantly stronger for those expecting alcohol to increase aggression than for those expecting either a decrease or no effect on aggression. This finding lends support to expectancy-based explanations of alcohol's effects.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1989

Expectancy set, self-reported expectancies and predispositional traits: predicting interest in violence and erotica.

To investigate the role of alcohol expectancies in predicting postdrinking behavior, two studies were conducted. In Study 1, an instrument assessing alcohol expectancies was devised for later use in prediction. Factor analyses with split-sample validation confirmed 3 factors (11 total items): disinhibition, aggression and sexuality. In Study 2, expectancies, Buss-Durkee hostility and Mosher sex-guilt were assessed in a preexperimental questionnaire session. In a subsequent drink administration session, an expectancy set manipulation led subjects to expect alcohol or to expect tonic. To assess postdrinking behavior, interest in violent, erotic and violent-erotic materials was measured unobtrusively using an ad lib slide-viewing task. Consistent with the hypotheses, expectancies in conjunction with trait hostility significantly predicted violence viewing and violent-erotica viewing for expect alcohol, but not expect tonic controls. Moreover, after variance due to hostility was accounted for, expectancies predicted violence viewing significantly and violent-erotica viewing marginally. These findings provide modest support for the proposition that preexisting alcohol expectancies mediate between the effects of expectancy set and postdrinking behaviors. Once activated by perceived alcohol ingestion, these expectancies can shape postdrinking behaviors. The findings also underscore the need for further experimentation aimed at clarifying the interrelationships between alcohol expectancies and expectancy set.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1988

Self-reported alcohol expectancies for self and other as a function of behavior type and dosage set.

The hypothesis that expectancies about alcohol's effects on behavior vary as a function of behavior type and dosage set was tested in two self-report studies. In Study 1, 85 male and 88 female college students estimated how a moderate versus high dosage of alcohol would affect three social and three nonsocial behaviors selected from Southwick, Steele, Marlatt, and Lindell's (1981) alcohol expectancy questionnaire. In Study 2, 61 male and 113 female college students estimated how alcohol would affect the same behaviors, but they estimated the effects on another person (male or female) rather than on themselves. Results from both studies indicated that subjects expected a moderate dose of alcohol to have greater effects on social than nonsocial behavior, and they expected a high dose to have greater effects on nonsocial than social behavior. Gender also influenced the expected strength of alcohol effects.

Adult↗
PubMed1988

Analogue measurement of alcohol consumption: effects for task type and correspondence with self-report measurement.

Properties of a widely used measure of analogue alcohol consumption, the taste-rating task, were investigated. It was predicted and found that the taste-rating task led to more frequent sipping, smaller sip volume and a steeper decline in sipping across the 15 min drinking period than a procedurally similar tavern-evaluation task. These data demonstrate that the taste-rating task conveys implicit "how to drink" demands that seem to alter natural drinking topography. Examination of the correspondence between self-report and analogue consumption revealed that preexperimental estimates of typical drinking were significant yet modest predictors of analogue consumption. Moreover, postexperimental estimates of analogue consumption revealed that subjects accurately self-reported laboratory drinking, with taste-rating subjects showing more accuracy. Limitations of taste-rating methodology and directions for further investigation of analogue consumption measures are discussed.

Adult↗
PubMed1983

Alcoholism. The evolution of a behavioral perspective.

Behavioral approaches to understanding the etiology of alcoholism represent a divergence from traditional biomedical and psychodynamic models. The behavioral perspective subsumes a number of diverse conceptual models that share a common emphasis on the interplay between environmental forces and the response of the organism (S-R model). Yet these models--classical conditioning, drive reduction, and operant conditioning--offer different procedural paradigms and explanatory mechanisms. Through consistent application of the scientific method, certain behavioral principles from these models have survived empirical validation and continue to enrich our understanding of alcoholism. This chapter reviews these models and their attendant empirical findings, from both animal and human research, as they pertain to the etiology of alcoholism. The cognitive-behavioral approach, a recent product of this evolutionary development, focuses on cognitive processes that mediate stimulus-response relationships. The cognitive-behavioral model provides a comprehensive account of both the acquisition and maintenance of problem drinking and is discussed in some detail.

Alcoholism↗
PubMed1976

Biochemical changes during the initial stages of industrial lead exposure.

Biochemical measurements were carried out on 20 workers entering employment in a lead industry. Blood lead (Pb-B) urinary delta-aminolevulinic acid (ALA), and coproporphyrin (CP) levels were determined before entry and then at approximately weekly intervals for the first 12 weeks of employment. Levels of blood lead began to increase in all men within one week rising from an average pre-employment figure of about 1-1 mumol/l (22 mug/100 ml) to a value of about 2-9 mumol/l (60 mug/100 ml) at three weeks. Subsequently there was only a small increase in Pb-B values levelled for the rest of the period.

Adult↗