The effects of alcohol alone or in combination with other drugs on information processing, task performance and subjective responses
✍ Scribed by J. S. Kerr; I. Hindmarch
- Publisher
- John Wiley and Sons
- Year
- 1998
- Tongue
- English
- Weight
- 145 KB
- Volume
- 13
- Category
- Article
- ISSN
- 0885-6222
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
✦ Synopsis
This paper reviews the eects of alcohol on human psychomotor performance and cognitive function. It concentrates particularly on eects on reaction time and on skills related to car driving. The eects of alcohol on performance are very variable at low doses (under 1 g per kg body weight). The variability is due to the dierent measures and methods employed by the researchers and to the large interindividual and interoccasional dierences in the eects of alcohol. That is, alcohol aects dierent people in dierent ways and it aects the same person dierently on separate occasions. Greater performance de®cits are observed as the dose increases and as the tasks become more complex. Although results vary, both nicotine and caeine appear to antagonize the detrimental eects of alcohol on performance. Many other drugs interact with alcohol, the most important of which are sedative agents that can combine synergistically with alcohol to produce profound psychomotor and cognitive impairment.