Enhanced Alcohol-Specific but not General Pavlovian-to-Instrumental Transfer in Alcohol Use Disorder

Authors

Chen, H., Baeuchl, C., Thill, L., Belanger, M. J., Marxen, M., Krasniqi, S., Garbusow, M., Friedel, E., Pilhatsch, M., Heinz, A., Smolka, M. N.

Abstract

Background: Pavlovian-to-instrumental transfer (PIT) paradigms assess how environmental cues influence instrumental behaviour. Our previous research linked PIT to alcohol use disorder (AUD) and high-risk drinking using monetary rewards during learning. To better capture alcohol-related cue effects, we developed a PIT paradigm delivering trial-by-trial alcohol and juice rewards alongside monetary rewards, to examine alcohol-specific and general PIT effects in parallel. Methods: Seventy-five participants with AUD and ninety-five controls completed the task during functional magnetic resonance imaging. Alcohol-specific PIT was defined as increased alcohol choices during presentation of alcohol-associated versus juice-associated cues. General PIT was defined as increased response vigor during gain- versus loss-associated cues. Behavioural and neural associations with AUD status and AUDIT scores from baseline through one-year follow-up were examined. Results: Participants with AUD showed stronger alcohol-specific PIT effect than controls. Alcohol-specific PIT was positively associated with baseline AUDIT scores and with AUDIT scores across the one-year follow-up. Alcohol cues elicited stronger anterior insula responses, and region-of-interest analysis showed greater left amygdala responses to alcohol versus juice cues in AUD compared with controls. In contrast, general PIT showed a negative association with AUDIT but no association with AUD status. In the general PIT, no AUD-related neural differences were observed. Conclusions: These findings suggest that alcohol-specific PIT captures a clinically meaningful mechanism of cue-driven alcohol seeking that is distinct from generalized motivational transfer, supporting its potential utility as a mechanistic marker in AUD.

Preprint server: bioRxiv
The authors list and abstract were imported from bioRxiv on 07 Sep 2026.

Stats

1-terrible, 9-excellent. How would you rate this preprint? Sign in in to submit your rating.

Post a comment

You need to be signed in to post comments. You can sign in here.

Comments

There are no comments yet.