Acute alcohol intoxication, or alcohol “priming,” leads to increased desire for and self-administration of alcohol (37), effects which are dose-dependent (38). As well as increasing motivation to drink, alcohol priming also leads to changes in cognitive functions, including disinhibition. For example, moderate (0.4 g/kg) to large (0.8 g/kg) doses of alcohol impair inhibitory control on a variety of behavioral measures (39, 40). Furthermore, these deficits are evident at doses too low to disrupt general psychomotor performance, suggesting fairly selective effects of acute alcohol on disinhibition [see detailed reviews from Fillmore (41) and (42)]. More recent research demonstrates that the effects of alcohol intoxication on disinhibition may be particularly pronounced when participants are required to inhibit their responding to alcohol cues (43) [but see (44)], a point that we return to later.
