Visual P3a in Male Alcoholics and Controls

Abstract

The goal of this study was to assess the P3a component of event-related potentials in a population of abstinent, chronic alcoholics. A three-stimulus visual oddball paradigm was used to elicit robust P3a components in a large group of well-characterized male alcoholics (n = 44) and controls (n = 28). The task required subjects to make a difficult perceptual discrimination between randomly presented, frequently occurring vertical lines ( 3 0 ) and infrequent target lines that were tilted 2" to the right of vertical (.lo) by only responding with a button press to the target stimuli. A nontarget infrequent horizontal line occurred (.lo) randomly to which no response was made. The target stimulus elicited robust late P3b components with a parietal maximum amplitude, and the nontarget stimulus elicited reliable P3a components with a fronto-central maximum amplitude distribution. Group differences in P3a were assessed using repeated measures ANCOVA analyses in five scalp regions. Alcoholic subjects produced smaller P3a amplitudes over the central, parietal, temporal, and occipital areas compared with controls. Current source density analyses supported these findings with extension of the differences between the groups to the frontal region. The results suggest that the P3a may be important in the evaluation of alcoholism and its heritability. Theoretical implications are discussed.

The use of current source density as electrophysiological correlates in neuropsychiatric disorders: A review of human studies

“…Differences in both P3 amplitude and CSD topography were also reported in visual oddball tasks in alcoholics (Rodriguez Holguin et al, 1999a; Cohen et al, 2002) as well as in their high risk offspring (Rodriguez Holguin et al, 1999b), although the group differences were topographically different in the visual task compared to the auditory mode. For example, Cohen et al (2002) reported a modality-specific pattern in that alcoholics manifested weaker P3 sources mainly over the frontal region in the auditory modality and primarily over the parietal-occipital region in the visual modality.…”

“…Differences in subject groups and task paradigms may be one of the major reasons for the lack of disorder-specific CSD markers. On the other hand, seemingly inconsistent topographic patterns even between studies with similar clinical groups and ERP tasks [e.g., Cohen et al (2002) and Rodriguez Holguin et al (1999a) in alcoholics using visual oddball task; Hada et al (2001) and Ramachandran et al (1996) in children of alcoholics using auditory oddball task] could be due to variations in sample characteristics and other methodological factors (e.g., sample matching, signal processing parameters, etc.). Replication studies with identical methodology are required to validate the phenomena under study (e.g., sensory, cognitive, emotional phenomena) in a given neuropsychiatric condition and to arrive at CSD-based clinical markers.…”

Neurocognitive deficits in male alcoholics: An ERP/sLORETA analysis of the N2 component in an equal probability Go/NoGo task

“…Evidence from electrophysiological studies have shown frontal lobe abnormalities in alcoholics (Begleiter et al, 1980; Hada et al, 2000; Kamarajan et al, 2004, 2005a; Michael et al, 1993; Padmanabhapillai et al, 2006; Porjesz and Begleiter, 1987; Rodriguez Holguin et al, 1999). Curtin and Fairchild (2003) have reported an intact parietal P3 and stimulus evaluation during alcohol intoxication but reduction in frontal components of ERP that index evaluative and regulative cognitive control processes.…”

“…ERP studies of long term alcoholics as well as on individuals at risk for developing alcoholism, have consistently reported reduced P3 amplitude in various task paradigms (Begleiter et al, 1984; Cohen et al, 2002; Ehlers et al, 2007; Ehlers et al, 2001; Hada et al, 2000; Hill et al, 1999a; Hill and Shen, 2002; Hill et al, 1999b; Porjesz and Begleiter, 1987, 1990, 1991; Prabhu et al, 2001; Rodriguez Holguin et al, 1999; Suresh et al, 2003; for a meta-analysis see Polich et al, 1994; Porjesz et al, 2005). In Go/NoGo tasks, the anteriorly distributed NoGo P3 potentials have markedly reduced amplitudes in alcoholic subjects as well as in high-risk individuals, indicating impaired inhibitory control in these individuals (Cohen et al, 1997a, b; Kamarajan et al, 2005a; Kamarajan et al, 2005b; Saunders et al, 2008).…”

Neural correlates of performance monitoring in daily and intermittent smokers

“…Studies of drug users have found disrupted ERN response in regular users cocaine (Franken et al, 2007), and alcohol (Schellekens et al, 2010) and disrupted Pe/P300 in users cannabis (Fridberg et al, 2013), cocaine (Franken et al, 2007), and alcohol (Polich & Ochoa, 2004; Rodriguez Holguin et al, 1999). Fridberg et al (2013) found no ERN differences between controls and chronic cannabis users.…”