The impact of alcohol on the different components of working memory

Opperman, I

The impact of alcohol on the different components of working memory

dc.contributor.author	Opperman, I
dc.date.accessioned	2019-11-11T12:51:57Z
dc.date.available	2019-11-11T12:51:57Z
dc.date.issued	2018
dc.description	A thesis submitted to the Faculty of Humanities, in fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2018	en_ZA
dc.description.abstract	Alcohol consumption related deficits on complex executive functions and short-term memory have been reported in the literature, usually based on group comparisons. A repeated measures design was used, assessing 21 to 35 year old male participants (n = 16) on the Automated Working Memory Assessment’s twelve verbal and visuo-spatial short-term and working memory subtests. A low dose of alcohol (13.6 grams) was administered, breath alcohol concentration (BAC) was measured and subjective feelings of stimulation were assessed on the Brief Biphasic Alcohol Effects Scale (B-BAES). Repeated measures analysis of (co)variance models indicated that performance improved on the working memory processing tasks, particularly in the verbal domain. This may have been related to changes in attention functions, stimulus evaluation task demands and tacit recall. However, several of the short-term memory tasks deteriorated under the experimental condition, where Word Recall was significant when age was controlled for. This may have been due to alcohol-related changes in stimulus representations. Partial correlation coefficients suggested that higher BACs were related to deficits in performance if participant age was controlled for. The structure of the B-BAES was consistent with the literature, but subjective feelings of stimulation were not associated with performance changes. Shorter test-retest delays were slightly associated with improved performance, but the research data did not fully support practice effects or a mitigating influence of alcohol consumption. Based on the findings, the specific influence of alcohol consumption on working memory could depend on methodological design, task types, memory domain and other sources of variance.	en_ZA
dc.description.librarian	M T 2019	en_ZA
dc.format.extent	Online resource (322 pages)
dc.identifier.citation	Opperman, Ingrid (2018) The impact of alcohol on the different components of working memory, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, https://hdl.handle.net/10539/28407
dc.identifier.uri	https://hdl.handle.net/10539/28407
dc.language.iso	en	en_ZA
dc.phd.title	PHD	en_ZA
dc.subject.lcsh	Substance abuse
dc.subject.lcsh	Drinking of alcoholic beverages
dc.subject.lcsh	Alcoholism
dc.title	The impact of alcohol on the different components of working memory	en_ZA
dc.type	Thesis	en_ZA