TY  - EJOU
AU  - Gibbons, Jeffrey Alan 
AU  - Pappalardo, Emily Anne 
AU  - Nolan, Molly Jean 

TI  - Never Again: Online Replication of the Fading Affect Bias in the Context of Alcohol during the COVID-19 Pandemic
T2  - International Journal of Mental Health Promotion

PY  - 
VL  - 
IS  - 
SN  - 2049-8543

AB  - <b>Backgrounds:</b> The Fading Affect Bias (FAB) is the faster fading of unpleasant than pleasant affect for autobiographical event memories, which is positively and negatively related to adaptive (e.g., grit) and non-adaptive measures (e.g., depression), respectively. In contrast to the reasonable expectation that maladaptive alcohol consumption should negatively predict the FAB, no such overall relation was found in the only study to examine it. Instead, alcohol consumption positively predicted the FAB for alcohol events and negatively predicted it for non-alcohol events. We used an online procedure during the Coronavirus Disease of 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic to test if the relation between alcohol and FAB would differ across event type. We also tested if continuous variables other than alcohol consumption would combine with event type to predict the FAB. <b>Methods:</b> A retrospective memory study was conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic, asking participants to provide an initial and current affect rating ranging from −3 (unpleasant) to +3 (pleasant) for pleasant and unpleasant events involving and not involving alcohol. <b>Results:</b> We replicated past research, finding that FAB was positively predicted by adaptive measures (e.g., rehearsal, positive affect from the Positive and Negative Affect Scale (PANAS), spirituality, positive religious coping, religiosity, Brief Cope, and grit) and negatively predicted by non-adaptive measures (negative religious coping and negative PANAS). Importantly, the FAB was positively predicted by non-adaptive alcohol measures. Furthermore, FAB was larger for alcohol than non-alcohol events at low spirituality, positive PANAS, and positive religious coping for non-alcohol events, and the FAB was larger for non-alcohol events than alcohol events at high spirituality, positive PANAS, and positive religious coping. Talking and thinking rehearsals mediated these complex effects. <b>Conclusions:</b> The positive relations between alcohol consumption and the FAB and the fact that alcohol consumption and event type did not combine to predict the FAB contradict the findings in the seminal study examining these relations. Therefore, the relation between the FAB and alcohol seems to have changed since 2013, and this change may have been produced by the COVID-19 pandemic.
KW  - Fading affect bias; alcohol; online; coronavirus disease of 2019 (COVID-19)

DO  - 10.32604/ijmhp.2026.080379