Cuing both positive and negative episodic foresight reduces delay discounting but does not affect risk-taking
- Authors: Bulley, Adam , Miloyan, Beyon , Pepper, Gillian , Gullo, Matthew , Henry, Julie , Suddendorf, Thomas
- Date: 2019
- Type: Text , Journal article
- Relation: Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology Vol. 72, no. 8 (2019), p. 1998-2017
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- Description: Humans frequently create mental models of the future, allowing outcomes to be inferred in advance of their occurrence. Recent evidence suggests that imagining positive future events reduces delay discounting (the devaluation of reward with time until its receipt), while imagining negative future events may increase it. Here, using a sample of 297 participants, we experimentally assess the effects of cued episodic simulation of positive and negative future scenarios on decision-making in the context of both delay discounting (monetary choice questionnaire) and risk-taking (balloon-analogue risk task). Participants discounted the future less when cued to imagine positive and negative future scenarios than they did when cued to engage in control neutral imagery. There were no effects of experimental condition on risk-taking. Thus, although these results replicate previous findings suggesting episodic future simulation can reduce delay discounting, they indicate that this effect is not dependent on the valence of the thoughts, and does not generalise to all other forms of impulsive decision-making. We discuss various interpretations of these results, and suggest avenues for further research on the role of prospection in decision-making.
An evolutionary perspective on the co-occurrence of social anxiety disorder and alcohol use disorder
- Authors: Bulley, Adam , Miloyan, Beyon , Brilot, Ben , Gullo, Matthew , Suddendorf, Thomas
- Date: 2016
- Type: Text , Journal article
- Relation: Journal of Affective Disorders Vol. 196, no. (2016), p. 62-70
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- Description: Social Anxiety Disorder (SAD) commonly co-occurs with, and often precedes, Alcohol Use Disorder (AUD). In this paper, we address the relationship between SAD and AUD by considering how natural selection left socially anxious individuals vulnerable to alcohol use, and by addressing the underlying mechanisms. We review research suggesting that social anxiety has evolved for the regulation of behaviors involved in reducing the likelihood or consequences of threats to social status. The management of potential threats to social standing is important considering that these threats can result in reduced cooperation or ostracism - and therefore to reduced access to coalitional partners, resources or mates. Alcohol exerts effects upon evolutionarily conserved emotion circuits, and can down-regulate or block anxiety (or may be expected to do so). As such, the ingestion of alcohol can artificially signal the absence or successful management of social threats. In turn, alcohol use may be reinforced in socially anxious people because of this reduction in subjective malaise, and because it facilitates social behaviors - particularly in individuals for whom the persistent avoidance of social situations poses its own threat (i.e., difficulty finding mates). Although the frequent co-occurrence of SAD and AUD is associated with poorer treatment outcomes than either condition alone, a richer understanding of the biological and psychosocial drives underlying susceptibility to alcohol use among socially anxious individuals may improve the efficacy of therapeutic interventions aimed at preventing or treating this comorbidity. © 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.