Attentional processes in alcohol-mediated aggression.

Abstract

To evaluate the role of attention in the production of alcohol-mediated aggression, 72 male social drinkers were given either alcoholic or placebo beverages. Subjects were told they were being tested for reaction time while (bogus) partners were being tested for pain perception. Subjects were to press, as fast as possible, 1 of 5 buttons, indicating various levels of intensity, which they believed would not only terminate a stimulus tone but also deliver an electric shock to their partners. Subjects were placed in 1 of 3 conditions where they were forced to attend to information on behavior contingencies (asked to record pain level), given no attentional instructions, or distracted from contingency-relevant information (asked to solve arithemetic problems). A 2 .times. 3 analysis of variance of shock intensity variance scores revealed a significant condition main effect and a drug .times. condition interaction. Mean shock duration scores of subjects in the alcohol-forced-attention group were significantly higher than those of subjects in the alcohol-distraction and placebo-distraction groups, at shock levels 1, 3, 4 and 5, and of subjects in the placebo-no-instruction group, at shock levels 3 and 5. Mean shock duration scores of subjects in the placebo-forced-attention group were higher than those of subjects in the alcohol-distraction and placebo-distraction groups at shock level 1.