the latter group. Once these disinhibited mental sets have been induced, this allows us to investigate whether disinhibited (versus restrained) mental sets have a causal influence on craving and food or alcohol consumption, something which was accomplished by measuring these things immediately after participants had completed the Stop Signal task. The findings were clear: participants in whom a disinhibited mental set had been induced subsequently consumed more food (86) or beer (87, 88) compared to participants in whom a restrained mental set had been induced. A follow-up study demonstrated that these differential task instructions also influenced an electrophysiological index of (dis)inhibition, the amplitude of the P300b event-related potential (66). In all of the alcohol studies (66, 87, 88), individual differences in disinhibition (both behavioral measures and their electrophysiological correlates) were positively correlated with consumption of beer: those participants who were most “disinhibited” after this manipulation of mental set, consumed the most beer immediately afterward. However, despite influencing drinking behavior, these task instructions had no effect on subjective alcohol craving in any of these studies. Overall, these studies provide direct support for the notion that a disinhibited mental set can lead to increased alcohol consumption, at least in laboratory settings. Importantly,
