A presentation about alcohol to folks drinking alcohol

Author: Wesley Vaught | Majors: Biology, Biochemistry | Semester: Fall 2024

My name is Wesley Vaught, and I am a senior biology and biochemistry double major with psychology, medical humanities, and gender studies minors. Other CODA lab members and I went to New Orleans, LA to present our research at the Society for Psychophysiological Research (SPR). I contributed to three projects and presented two of these projects involving two event-related potentials (ERPs): the late positive potential (LPP) and the N200. ERPs are essential for cognitive neuroscience because they allow researchers to give a cognitive process, such as attention and inhibitory control, a physiological marker. For example, when a participant has a more positive LPP, they are giving the stimulus that they are looking at more attention, and when a participant has a higher amplitude of a N200, they are choosing not to press a button during a cognitive task (inhibition control). My first author poster that I presented at this conference involved how much attention participants with problems with alcohol were giving to alcohol cues (beer, wine, liquor) relative to neutral images (bikes, leaves, doors). The construct of “how much attention” is quantified by the LPP. We found that participants that scored higher on problematic drinking measures had a more positive LPP to alcohol cues than neutral cues only when the participants also had lower distress tolerance. This association implies attention to these cues could be driven by the drinking to cope motive that is delineated in the motivation model of alcohol use (Cox & Klinger, 1988). The other poster I presented was a meta-analytic review (think a step below a meta-analysis) of the association between anxiety and the N200. We found there was not consistent association although moderators (other factors) altered associations in many studies: age, gender, and task type.

While presenting my two posters, many researchers gave their feedback: one professor suggested that the ERP I was designating the LPP in my Neural Correlates of Problematic Drinking and Attention to Alcohol Images was another ERP called the P300, and another professor made claims that our isolation of “inhibition control” to the N200 was naïve as cognitive control affected the shape of the entire waveform. My advice to students as I reflect on this conference is it is okay to say, “I am not sure.” Like I mentioned before, professors will approach you at your poster, and you are still an undergraduate! You are still learning. That is something that I made sure to tell myself at this conference relative to the conference I went to last year when a professor was accusatory about our data, perhaps, being fabricated. This lesson is one I will take with me as I graduate in December and proceed to who knows what! I am applying for the Rhodes scholarship and MD/PhD programs simultaneously, so the “when” and “where” are unsure right now. That ambiguity lends itself to some anxiety, but regardless of the outcome, I believe I will be prepared for what is next. That is comforting right now.