The effect of image complexity on attentional bias towards alcohol-related images in adult drinkers

Abstract

Aim: Visual probe tasks are often used to measure attentional bias (AB) towards alcohol-related images in drinkers, but little is known about the effect of the properties of the images used in this task: specifically, image complexity.

Methods: AB was examined in a group of adult drinkers (n = 25). Two measures of attentional bias were obtained from a modified visual probe task. First, a traditional dot probe detection task measured attentional bias in drinkers based on their reaction times to probes replacing neutral and alcohol-related images. Secondly, an eye-tracking measure was applied to this task to directly assess the drinkers' eye gazes to the alcohol-related and neutral images. The effect of image complexity was examined by comparing AB towards images classified as simple and complex.

Findings: Results showed that drinkers displayed AB only towards simple alcohol-related images as measured by both probe RT and fixation times.

Conclusion: These findings suggest that complex alcohol-related images might be less effective at capturing drinkers' attention and could result in less attentional bias when used in visual probe tasks.

Figure 1

Mean probe reaction time (ms) to neutral and alcohol-related images presented as either simple or complex. Capped vertical lines indicate standard error of the mean (SEM).

Figure 2

Mean fixation time (ms) to neutral and alcohol-related pictures presented as either a simple or complex image. Capped vertical lines indicate standard error of the mean (SEM).