Ali M Yurasek

• University of Memphis

Behavioral economics (BE) suggests that adults are more likely to engage in enjoyable behaviors that are easily available and accessible (e.g., TV watching) compared to less enjoyable and available alternatives (physical activity). This feasibility trial of a 4-week telehealth program aimed to increase physical activity and reduce TV watching. Heal...

Objective: Cannabis use is increasing among college students and commonly co-occurs with anxiety symptoms in this age group. Interventions that reduce anxiety may also reduce cannabis use. Behavioral economic theory suggests that substance use reductions are most likely when there is an increase in substance-free reinforcement. This randomized pilo...

Introduction Increasing reinforcement received from cannabis-free activities, relative to reinforcement from cannabis-related activities, is one way to reduce harmful cannabis use. Thus, accurate measurement of cannabis reinforcement is important. Using convergent mixed methods, we developed the Adolescent Reinforcement Survey Schedule-Cannabis Use...

Purchase tasks are used to measure the value, or demand, for various substances by assessing the amount of a substance individuals would purchase across a series of escalating prices. Marijuana purchase task (MPT) has been previously developed; however, cannabis can be consumed in various forms and measurements, thus raising questions about the app...

Behavioral economics suggests that individuals are likely to engage in a behavior if it is more reinforcing and readily available than other possible options. In real-world environments, sedentary behaviors are often more reinforcing and easily available than physical activities. In order to promote regular physical activity in an environment with...

Objective: Despite extensive literature that has identified high rates of delay discounting as a behavioral correlate of substance misuse, associations of cannabis use measures and delay discounting are less consistent. Furthermore, there is very limited research examining cannabis use using cross-commodity delay discounting tasks, where the immed...

Objective: The purpose of this study was to examine patterns of concurrent cannabis and other substance use and their differential associations with cannabis-related problems and academic outcomes in college students. Participants: Participants were undergraduate students (N = 263; M age = 19.1 years; 61.2% female) who were eligible if they used ca...

Background Deaf and hard-of-hearing (DHH) patients are an underserved priority population. Existing, although contextually limited, findings indicate that DHH patients are more likely to use the emergency department (ED) than non-DHH patients. However, little attention has been given to the differences in ED utilization by patients’ language modali...

Motives for alcohol use and behavioral economic measures of demand are associated with alcohol consumption and alcohol-related problems. However, it is unclear how differences in reasons for alcohol use may affect alcohol demand. Additionally, although alcohol is commonly used to self-manage conditions such as pain and sleep problems, the impact of...

Study objectives: Cannabis use is common among young adults and has been proposed as a potential treatment for insomnia. However, controlled studies examining the impact of cannabis use on insomnia symptoms are rare. This secondary analysis of published trial data tested cannabis use during cognitive behavioral treatment for insomnia (CBT-I) as a...

Alcohol use disorder is by far the most prevalent substance use disorder in the general population and is a major contributor to disease worldwide. Recovery from the disorder is a dynamic process of change, and individuals take many different routes to resolve their alcohol problems and seek to achieve a life worth living. Total abstention is not t...

Background The marijuana purchase task (MPT) is a commonly used behavioral economic measure of relative cannabis value (i.e. demand) that presents specific methodological concerns due to non-standardized measurement, variability in modality of use, and evolving legalization policies. Refinement of the task is critical to improve task ecological val...

Objective: To examine the Acquired Preparedness Model using a behavioral impulsivity facet and positive marijuana expectancies to examine direct and indirect effects on marijuana use and related problems. Participants: 250 college students (61.7% female, 54% white) recruited from a southeastern university. Methods: Participants completed an online...

Delay discounting (DD) refers to the decrease in the subjective value of a reward as the delay to its receipt increases. As high rates of DD are consistently associated with measures of substance misuse, DD is an important construct in current conceptualizations of addiction. High rates of DD appear to model preference for the immediate rewards pro...

The demand for opioid medication to effectively treat pain has contributed to the surging opioid crisis, which is a major source of morbidity and mortality in the U.S. More than 100,000 people begin opioid maintenance treatment (OMT) annually, the standard pharmacotherapy for opioid use disorder (OUD). Although OMT is the standard care for OUD, pat...

Insomnia symptoms have been linked to problematic marijuana use among young adults, but the mechanism underlying this association and whether sex differences exist, remains unclear. Using cross‐sectional data, this study examined negative mood as a mediator of the association between insomnia and marijuana problems among male and female college stu...

Introduction Insomnia symptoms have been linked to problematic marijuana use among young adults, but the mechanism underlying this association remains unclear. This study examined negative mood as a mediator of the association between insomnia and marijuana problems among young adults. Methods Undergraduate students (N=276, 62% female, 52% White,...

Understanding influences and predictors of adolescent alcohol use is necessary for treatment and prevention efforts. Although parent, sibling, and peer substance use have demonstrated associations with adolescent drinking, there is a need to examine the unique predictive role of each variable across time. The purpose of the current study was to lon...

Behavioral economics states that alcohol misuse is inversely related with reinforcement from alternative sources, as operationalized by Herrnstein’s matching law. Thus, alcohol misuse is influenced by environmental constrains and is promulgated by deprivation of reward from alternative (nonalcohol) sources. This chapter briefly describes the histor...

Purpose of Review The purpose of this review is to provide an overview of the existing literature on the relationship between the co-use of cannabis and alcohol including (1) epidemiology, comorbidity, and associated consequences of cannabis and alcohol use disorders; (2) preclinical and clinical laboratory studies examining behavioral pharmacology...

Many returning OIF/OEF/OND Veterans are seeking higher education in an effort to develop a meaningful career and financial stability. Evidence suggests that student service members/veterans (SSM/Vs) are experiencing less academic success than other students. The purpose of this review is to identify the unique challenges of SSM/Vs and evaluate curr...

A recent study demonstrated that a single 50-min supplemental session that targeted the behavioral economic mechanisms of substance-free reinforcement and delayed reward discounting (Substance-Free Activity Session: SFAS) enhanced the efficacy of a standard alcohol brief motivational intervention (BMI) for college drinkers. The purpose of the curre...

The present study attempted to determine whether behavioral economic indices of elevated alcohol reward value, measured before and immediately after a brief alcohol intervention, predict treatment response. Participants were 133 heavy drinking college students (49.6% female, 51.4% male; 64.3% Caucasian, 29.5% African American) who were randomized t...

Behavioral economic purchase tasks can be readily used to assess demand for a number of addictive substances, including alcohol, tobacco, and illicit drugs. However, several methodological limitations associated with the techniques used to quantify demand may reduce the utility of demand measures. In the present study, we sought to introduce area u...

The present study examined (1) the impact of a brief substance use intervention on delay discounting and indices of substance reward value (RV), and (2) whether baseline values and posttreatment change in these behavioral economic variables predict substance use outcomes. Participants were 97 heavy drinking college students (58.8% female, 41.2% mal...

Motivational interviewing (MI) is client-centered counseling style that focuses on exploring and resolving ambivalence, and centers on motivational processes within the individual to facilitate change. Consistent with the transtheoretical model of behavior change, MI asserts that the therapy should be tailored to the person's level of readiness or...

Objective: Behavioral economic demand curves measure alcohol consumption as a function of price and may capture clinically relevant individual differences in alcohol-reinforcing efficacy. This study used a novel, behavioral-economic, hypothetical demand-curve paradigm to examine the association between family history of alcohol misuse and individu...

Emotion regulation predicts drug use among college binge drinkers

Objective: Cigarette smokers have higher levels of alcohol consumption than nonsmokers and poorer response to alcohol treatment. It is possible that the greater severity of alcohol problems observed in smokers reflects a greater susceptibility to alcohol-related reinforcement. The present study used a behavioral economic purchase task to investiga...

Background: Behavioral economic demand curves measure individual differences in motivation for alcohol and have been associated with problematic patterns of alcohol use, but little is known about the variables that may contribute to elevated demand. Negative visceral states have been theorized to increase demand for alcohol and to contribute to ex...

What is already known about this subject: • Brief motivational interventions have been found to be efficacious for obesity in older adult populations. • Brief motivational interventions including delivery of personalized feedback have been found to be efficacious for reducing college student drinking. What this study adds: • First study to test...

Several studies have shown that demand curve indices of the reinforcing efficacy of alcohol (i.e., reports of hypothetical alcohol consumption and expenditures across a range of drink prices) are associated with alcohol-related outcomes. A next logical step in this area of research is to examine potential mediators of this direct relationship. It i...

Among college students, several studies have found a positive relationship between physical activity and alcohol use. The current study tested gender, Greek status, and ethnicity as potential moderators of the physical activity-alcohol use relationship. Participants were college freshmen (n = 310) endorsing alcohol/drug use. Students completed ques...

Studies have shown that impulsivity-related traits are associated with alcohol use among college students. It is possible that individual differences in susceptibility to reinforcement from alcohol, which reflects the extent to which an individual values alcohol, moderates this relationship. Data were collected from 255 college students at a large,...