Mapping the neural circuitry of habit re-training: a novel approach for behaviour change in Alcohol Use Disorder

Summary

Alcohol use disorder is a serious public health problem, causing significant harm to people and their families, but standard treatments for problem alcohol use are not as effective as one might hope. Four out of 10 people who seek help for alcohol use drop out of treatment early, and for those who complete treatment, the beneficial effects are short lived, as patients relapse on average 6.5 months after leaving treatment. There is thus an urgent need for novel, theoretically principled interventions to improve treatment adherence and outcome.

We aim to address this unmet clinical need by evaluating a novel psychological intervention (habit re-training) that is based on therapeutic translations of recent insights from behavioural neuroscience. Findings from research in animals have shown that regular alcohol use disrupts brain systems that are critical for controlling our behaviour.

Chronic alcohol use has further been shown to render regular behaviour such as drinking inflexible, so that individuals are prone to drink automatically when they find themselves in certain situations. Standard treatments typically address cue-induced conscious cravings (which in some cases may accompany habitual drinking) but not the automatic habit.

As habit re-training focuses directly on individuals' habitual drinking pattern rather than on their alcohol-related beliefs or craving, it might be more suitable for patients who do not benefit from standard treatment alone.

Project aims

Our novel psychological intervention complements standard care. In the present study, we will evaluate the feasibility of our novel intervention in people with different levels of alcohol use severity and compare treatment outcome with that of standard care alone.

In order to understand the mechanism by which habit re-training leads to behaviour change in problem drinkers, we will also investigate brain networks implicated in the control over behaviour.

This will not only help us understand why some patients may benefit more from habit re-training than from standard care, but also inform clinical practice to better identify and/or amend treatments for non-responders.

Contact details

Professor Karen Ersche - ke220@cam.ac.uk

Opportunities

This project is open to applicants who want to do a:

• PhD