One novel approach to treatment would be to directly target the cognitive processes that have a causal influence on substance self-administration. This treatment strategy has the potential to complement (but not replace) existing approaches based on pharmacotherapy and “talking therapies” (89, 90). Despite this being a relatively underdeveloped area of research, some forms of this “cognitive training” appear to be effective in alcohol dependence (91, 92). This raises the question of whether inhibitory control can be directly trained. One approach is to require patients to repeatedly practice self-control tasks, something which should (in theory) increase the strength of the inhibitory control (or self-control) “muscle,” according to the resource model of self-control. Some studies have demonstrated that improving general control processes can lower alcohol consumption and reduce the risk of smoking relapse (93, 94). In more general terms, Hagger et al. (48) reported an overall large effect size for the effects of self-control training on health-related behaviors.
