How We View The Future May Hold Key To Recovery

HORIZON OR CLIFT? –

Jan. 29, 2022 – Virginia Tech scientists examined alcohol use disorder recovery in 110 adults who had met criteria for alcohol abuse and dependence in the International Quit and Recovery Registry, an online data collection site and forum developed at Virginia Tech in 2011.

People with “slow life-history” strategies were more focused on future rewards and personal growth. They exhibited positive economic, health, and personal development behaviors. They were more likely to be in remission from alcohol use disorder.

People with “fast life-history” strategies were more focused on immediate rewards and showed comparatively reduced concern for personal health. Researchers suspect people with alcohol use disorder who exhibit faster life-history strategies may face greater challenges during recovery.

In either strategy, decision-making is influenced by the length of the temporal window of integration — how far in the future people can imagine and integrate into their present choices — according to study first author Liqa Athamneh, a postdoctoral associate who began her research with Bickel while a student in Virginia Tech’s Translational Biology, Medicine, and Health graduate program.

The temporal window of integration was evaluated through a delay-discounting task that involved choosing between lower amounts of money in the short term, or larger amounts in the longer term.

Individuals in recovery from alcohol use disorder who indicated “fast life-history” strategies exhibited a shorter temporal window and excessive delay discounting. The current research suggests that delay discounting could serve to predict an individual’s experience of recovery and remission, which is important because recovery from alcohol use disorder typically involves relapses. Potential new treatments may benefit from the understanding of the relationship of life-history theories and remission, the researchers said.