title: Dissociation of the acute effects of alcohol on implicit and explicit memory processes.
abstract: The effects of alcohol (0, 0.3 and 0.6 g/kg) on learning and memory were assessed in independent groups of male student volunteers. Subjects were shown a list of words and asked to form an image of a scene involving each word 1 hr after drinking an alcohol-containing beverage. Alcohol consumption impaired the ability of subjects to explicitly remember the words in a test of free recall. However, no impairment was observed if memory for the same material was assessed implicitly using a backwards-reading or word-completion task. That is, both alcohol-and placebo-treated subjects showed similar degrees of priming. The data indicate that alcohol's effects on memory are selective.
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Clinical Studies, NIAAA, DICBR, NIH, Bethesda, MD 20892.
authors.forename: R G
authors.initials: RG
authors.lastname: Lister
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Gorenstein
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Fisher-Flowers
authors.forename: H J
authors.initials: HJ
authors.lastname: Weingartner
authors.forename: M J
authors.initials: MJ
authors.lastname: Eckardt
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000435:Alcoholic Intoxication / Q000523:psychology*; D001288:Attention / Q000187:drug effects; D004305:Dose-Response Relationship, Drug; D000431:Ethanol / Q000493:pharmacokinetics; D006801:Humans; D007092:Imagination / Q000187:drug effects; D008297:Male; D011939:Mental Recall / Q000187:drug effects*; D010153:Paired-Associate Learning / Q000187:drug effects; D011932:Reading; D012153:Retention, Psychology / Q000187:drug effects*; D014706:Verbal Learning / Q000187:drug effects*
chemical_list: D000431:Ethanol