Several studies demonstrated that alcohol-dependent patients show altered responses to alcohol-related cues. It is assumed that the regular association of these cues with the ingestion of alcohol leads to conditioned reactions, motivating reward or relief craving and instigating drug intake.
A group of German investigators has reported on this phenomenon in the current issue of Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics. They used an innovative method for studying this issue: the measurement of startle reflex, which is the eyeblink response to a sudden loud noise, that is normally inhibited by a pleasant foreground and potentiated when unpleasant stimuli are presented. Thus, it is a reliable method to assess the affective valence of emotional stimuli without having to rely on the self-report of patients. Previous investigations with alcohol-dependent patients have shown that an attenuation of the affect-modulated startle reflex was demonstrated when patients were viewing alcohol-associated pictures indicating an appetitive valence of the alcohol-associated stimuli.