IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/plo/pone00/0108897.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Attentional Bias in Snus Users: An Experimental Study

Author

Listed:
  • Rune Aune Mentzoni
  • Bjørn Sætrevik
  • Helge Molde
  • Nora Wiium
  • Jørn Hetland
  • Ida Fagerland
  • Linn Tinnesand Nordnes
  • Sunniva Straume Storemark
  • Ingrid Nesdal Fossum
  • Ståle Pallesen

Abstract

The use of nicotine in the form of “snus” is substantial and increasing in some geographic areas, in particular among young people. It has previously been suggested that addictions may operate through a mechanism of attentional bias, in which stimuli representative of the dependent substance increase in salience, thus increasing the addictive behavior. However, this hypothesis has not been tested for the case of snus. The current experiment used a modified Stroop task and a dot-probe task to investigate whether 40 snus users show an attentional bias towards snus-relevant stimuli, compared to 40 non-snus users. There were no significant differences between the two groups on reaction times or accuracy on either Stroop or dot-probe task, thus failing to show an attentional bias towards snus-relevant stimuli for snus users. This could imply that other mechanisms may contribute to maintenance of snus use than for other addictions. However, this is the first experimental study investigating attentional bias in snus users, and more research is warranted.

Suggested Citation

  • Rune Aune Mentzoni & Bjørn Sætrevik & Helge Molde & Nora Wiium & Jørn Hetland & Ida Fagerland & Linn Tinnesand Nordnes & Sunniva Straume Storemark & Ingrid Nesdal Fossum & Ståle Pallesen, 2014. "Attentional Bias in Snus Users: An Experimental Study," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 9(10), pages 1-6, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0108897
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0108897
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0108897
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0108897&type=printable
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1371/journal.pone.0108897?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0108897. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: plosone (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.