RT Journal Article
T1 Binge drinking affects attentional and visual working memory processing in young university students
A1 Crego Barreiro, Manuel Alberto
A1 Rodríguez Holguín, Socorro
A1 Parada Iglesias, María
A1 Mota Miranda, Nayara Graciella
A1 Corral Varela, María Montserrat
A1 Cadaveira Mahía, Fernando
K1 ERP
K1 Binge drinking
K1 University students
K1 Working memory
K1 Attention
K1 Event-related potentials
K1 Potenciales evocados
K1 Consumo intensivo de alcohol
K1 Estudiantes universitarios
K1 Memoria de trabajo
K1 Atención
AB Background:  Binge Drinking (BD) typically involves heavy drinking over a short time, followed by a period of abstinence, and is common among young people, especially university students. Animal studies have demonstrated that this type of alcohol consumption causes brain damage, especially in the nonmature brain. The aim of the present study was to determine how BD affects brain functioning in male and female university students, during the performance of a visual working memory task. Methods:  Event‐related potentials (ERPs) were recorded, with an extensive set of 32 scalp electrodes, in 95 first‐year university students (age range 18 to 20 years), comprising 42 binge drinkers (BD) and 53 controls, in a visual “identical pairs” continuous performance task. Principal components analysis was used to identify and analyze the N2 (negative waveform with a latency around 200 to 300 ms related to attentional processes) and P3 (positive waveform with a latency around 300 to 600 ms related to working memory processes) components of the ERPs. Results:  In the matching condition of the task, the N2 component in central and parietal regions was significantly larger in the BD than in the control group. In the control group, the P3 component was larger in the matching than in the nonmatching condition in the frontal, central, and parietal regions, whereas the BD group did not show any significant differences between conditions in any region. Conclusions:  The results of this study confirm the presence of electrophysiological differences between young university student binge drinkers and controls during the execution of a visual task with a high working memory load. The larger N2 in the BD group suggests higher levels of attentional effort required by this group to perform the task adequately. The absence of any differences in the P3 component in the different conditions (matching and nonmatching stimuli) in the BD group suggests a deficiency in the electrophysiological differentiation between relevant and irrelevant information, which may reflect some impairment of working memory processes
PB Wiley
SN 0145-6008
YR 2009
FD 2009
LK http://hdl.handle.net/10347/16832
UL http://hdl.handle.net/10347/16832
LA eng
NO Crego A; Rodríguez Holguín S; Parada M; Mota-Miranda N; Corral M; Cadaveira F (2009). Binge drinking affects attentional and visual working memory processing in young university students. Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, 33, 1870-1879. Doi:10.1111/j.1530-0277.2009.01025.x
NO This is the peer reviewed version of the following article: Crego A; Rodríguez Holguín S; Parada M; Mota-Miranda N; Corral M; Cadaveira F (2009). Binge drinking affects attentional and visual working memory processing in young university students. Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, 33, 1870-1879, which has been published in final form at  https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1530-0277.2009.01025.x. This article may be used for non-commercial purposes in accordance with Wiley Terms and Conditions for Use of Self-Archived Versions
NO This research was supported by Delegación del Gobierno para el Plan Nacional sobre Drogas, grant ref. 2005/ PN014, and by Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación of Spain, grant ref. EDU2008-03400
DS Minerva
RD 28 abr 2026