title: Memory for drug-related visual stimuli in young adult, cocaine-dependent polydrug users.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Implicit (unconscious) and explicit (conscious) memory associations with drugs have been examined primarily using verbal cues. However, drug seeking, drug use behaviors, and relapse in chronic cocaine and other drug users are frequently triggered by viewing substance-related visual cues in the environment. We thus examined implicit and explicit memory for drug picture cues to understand the relative extent to which conscious and unconscious memory facilitation of visual drug cues occurs during cocaine dependence.
  
  
  METHODS
  Memory for drug-related and neutral picture cues was assessed in 14 inpatient cocaine-dependent polydrug users and a comparison group of 21 young adults with limited drug experience (n = 35). Participants completed picture cue exposure, free recall and recognition tasks to assess explicit memory, and a repetition priming task to assess implicit memory.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Drug cues, compared to neutral cues, were better explicitly recalled and implicitly primed, and especially so in the cocaine group. In contrast, neutral cues were better explicitly recognized, and especially in the control group.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Certain forms of explicit and implicit memory for drug cues were enhanced in cocaine users compared to controls when memory was tested a short time following cue exposure. Enhanced unconscious memory processing of drug cues in chronic cocaine users may be a behavioral manifestation of heightened drug cue salience that supports drug seeking and taking. There may be value in expanding intervention techniques to utilize cocaine users' implicit memory system.
authors.affiliation: Center of Alcohol Studies, Rutgers - The State University of New Jersey , USA.
authors.forename: Suchismita
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Ray
authors.forename: Robert
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Pandina
authors.forename: Marsha E
authors.initials: ME
authors.lastname: Bates
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D019970:Cocaine-Related Disorders / Q000523:psychology*; D003463:Cues; D055030:Drug Users / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008568:Memory; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D060865:Repetition Priming; D055815:Young Adult