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Biomedical subjects

G T Wilson

Publications and source records attributed to G T Wilson.

107 records · Page 6Linked to original sources
PubMed1975

The aversive control of excessive alcohol consumption by chronic alcoholics in the laboratory setting.

The efficacy of several methods of aversive control of excessive alcoholic drinking was investigated in a semi-naturalistic setting that permitted objective measurement of the drinking behavior of chronic alcoholics. Studies 1A and 1B compared an excape-conditioning precedure with a control procedure in which aversive electrical shocks were administered before drinking. Neither procedure effectively decreased subjects' pretreatment, baseline alcoholic drinking behavior. In Study 2, aversive response-contingent shocks effectively suppressed alcoholic drinking, but drinking subsequently returned to its former levels after withdrawal of punishment. Self-administered shock appeared to be as effective as experimenter-administered punishment for controlling drinking, even when the punishment contingency was faded out over time. Study 3 replicated the suppressant effect of punishment, and demonstrated that contingent shock was significantly more effective than yoked, noncontingent shock. A direct comparison of self-versus experimenter-administered punishment suggested a possible slight advantage for the latter.

Adult↗
PubMed1974

Generalization of verbal conditioning to verbal and nonverbal behavior: group therapy with chronic psychiatric patients.

TWELVE CHRONIC HOSPITALIZED FEMALE PATIENTS RECEIVED TOKEN REINFORCEMENT CONTINGENT ON TWO SEPARATE CLASSES OF VERBALIZATIONS: (a) positive statements about optional activities available in the hospital setting, and (b) positive statements about people. Cross-class generalization of reinforced verbal responses about activities to overt behavior was tested by actual participation in activities; within-class generalization of verbal responses about people to verbalizations in another stimulus setting was assessed in a structured interview situation. A multiple baseline design with contingency reversals was employed to demonstrate experimental control of both classes of verbalizations in the group sessions. Positive statements about activities generalized to actual participation in activities, while generalization of positive statements about people to verbalization in the extragroup setting did not occur.

Adult↗
PubMedDate not supplied

An evaluation of the balanced placebo design in alcohol administration research.

Results from a study using the balanced placebo design to assess alcohol's effects on anxiety raise serious doubts about the utility of the design even at moderate blood alcohol concentrations. Despite being informed that they were not drinking alcohol, 44% of the subjects who were administered alcohol reported consuming at least some alcohol. Moreover, subjects' scores on the Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Index (MCSD) were associated with deception success, suggesting that individual differences in reporting bias influence the manipulation. In contrast, only 6% of subjects who were told that they had consumed alcohol but were given tonic water were not deceived. Among subjects in this placebo condition, scores on the MCSD were not associated with success of the deception. These data suggest that at a moderate dose of alcohol, drink deception in the antiplacebo condition is much more difficult to execute than in the placebo condition, and that deception in the former condition may be confounded with experimenter demand.

Adult↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Self-awareness, alcohol consumption, and reduced cardiovascular reactivity.

Seventy-two healthy males were divided into Type A and Type B groups using the Jenkins Activity Survey. Subjects were subdivided further into high and low self-awareness categories on the private self-consciousness factor of the Self-Consciousness Scale. After random assignment to consume alcohol (0.85 g/kg) or a placebo, subjects were exposed to four stressors presented at random: a self-disclosing speech, aversive noise, insoluble anagrams, and mental arithmetic. Blood pressure, heart rate, and finger pulse amplitude were monitored throughout. Among the major findings was increased systolic blood pressure (SBP) reactivity during the speech among Type As low in private self-consciousness. Alcohol dampened autonomic responsiveness only in this group. When self-involvement was measured as the ratio of first-person pronouns to total words spoken during the speech, sober Type As displayed a strong correlation between self-references and SBP reactions during the speech and arithmetic tasks. Alcohol attenuated the correlation, resulting in SBP response dampening, but it did not affect pronoun use. These results have implications for the study of individual differences in cardiovascular reactivity, sensitivity to alcohol effects, and the relation of alcohol consumption to coronary heart disease.

Adult↗