Executive functions and risky decision-making in patients with opiate dependence.
Recent evidence suggests that individuals with opiate dependence may have cognitive dysfunctions particularly within the spectrum of executive functioning and emotional processing. Such dysfunctions can also compromise daily decisions associated with risk-taking behaviors. However, it remains unclear whether patients addicted to opiates show impaired decision-making on gambling tasks that specify explicit rules for rewards and punishments and provide information about probabilities associated with different long-term outcomes. In this study, we examined 18 individuals with opiate dependence and 18 healthy comparison subjects, matched for age, gender, and education with the Game of Dice Task (GDT). The GDT is a gambling task with explicit rules for gains and losses and fix winning probabilities. In addition, all subjects completed a neuropsychological test battery that primarily focused on executive functions and a personality questionnaire. On the GDT, patients chose the risky alternatives more frequently than the control group. Patients' GDT performance was related to executive functioning but not to other neuropsychological constructs, personality or dependence specific variables with one exception that is the number of days of abstinence. Thus, patients with opiate dependence demonstrate abnormalities in decision-making that might be neuropsychologically associated with dysfunctional behavior in patients' daily lives. Decision-making and other neuropsychological functioning should be considered in the treatment of opiate dependence.
Brand
Matthias
M
Department of Physiological Psychology, University of Bielefeld, Germany. m.brand@uni-bielefeld.de <m.brand@uni-bielefeld.de>
Roth-Bauer
Martina
M
Driessen
Martin
M
Markowitsch
Hans J
HJ
D000328:Adult; D003657:Decision Making / Q000502:physiology*; D004644:Emotions / Q000502:physiology; D030141:Feedback, Psychological; D005260:Female; D005715:Gambling / Q000523:psychology; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D009293:Opioid-Related Disorders / Q000523:psychology*; D010556:Personality Tests; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales; D011597:Psychomotor Performance / Q000502:physiology*; D012309:Risk-Taking