Effects of moderate dose alcohol on visual contrast sensitivity for stationary and moving targets.

Effects of chronic alcoholism in the sensitivity to luminance contrast in vertical sinusoidal gratings

“…In this context, it is necessary to conduct further research seeking to refine the sample characteristics to establish intra and more homogeneous parameters between groups and thus further elucidate the effect of chronic alcohol use on visual perception of achromatic luminance contrast. Although the effects of moderate or acute alcohol consumption on visual CS are described by several studies reporting alterations in medium and high frequencies with greater damage in the range of spatial frequencies of 3.0 and 6.0 cpd (Andre, 1996;Nicholson, Andre, Tyrrell, Wang, & Leibowitz 1995;Weschke & Niedeggen 2012;Zhuang et al, 2012). Researches with human volunteers with histories of chronic consumption and in abstinent state are still little explored.…”

Alcohol increases spontaneous BOLD signal fluctuations in the visual network

“…Given that when GABA receptors are acutely exposed to ethanol there is a potentiation of GABA-inhibiting currents (Davies, 2003), the very high concentration of GABA receptors expressed in the occipital cortex can explain the inhibiting effects of alcohol on the metabolism of the visual system (Hill and Toffolon, 1990;Nicholson et al, 1995;Pearson and Timney, 1998;Watten et al, 1998;Wilson and Mitchell, 1983). In addition, it has been recently reported that ethanol may exert an inhibitory action on the excitatory effect of glutamate on the N-methyl-D-Aspartate (NMDA) receptors (Weiner and Valenzuela, 2006).…”

The effect of acute ethanol challenge on global visuospatial attention: Exaggeration of leftward bias in line bisection

“…Ethanol influences many aspects of visual performance: it decreases visual acuity (Mortimer, 1963; Wilson & Mitchell, 1983), spatial contrast sensitivity (Pearson & Timney, 1998; 1999; Roquelaure et al, 1995), particularly for moving targets (Andre et al, 1994; Nicholson et al, 1995), and critical flicker fusion frequency (Pearson & Timney, 1998; Virsu et al, 1973). It also modestly degrades color vision (Wallgren & Barry, 1970; Watten & Lie, 1996, Hill & Toffolon, 1990), as well as accommodation (Watten & Lie, 1996), stereoscopic depth perception (Hill & Toffolon, 1990; Neill et al, 1990; Watten & Lie, 1996; Wegner & Fahle, 1999; Nawrot et al, 2004), and motion perception per se (MacArthur & Sekuler, 1982; McNamee et al, 1980; Bates, 1989; Nawrot et al, 2004).…”

“…First, because ethanol has a putative differential effect on right versus left hemisphere function we hypothesized that intoxicated subjects would, compared to their performance in a nonintoxicated control condition, exhibit decreased pseudoneglect as indexed by smaller leftward error (or a frank rightward bias) in the line-bisection task. Second, because ethanol exerts a general deleterious effect on a variety of behavioral capacities, such as increasing sensory thresholds (Zulauf et al, 1988; Watten et al, 1998; Pearson & Timney, 1998; 1999; Andre et al, 1994; Nicholson et al, 1995) and reaction times (Young, 1970; Chandler & Parsons, 1977; Poppel & Steinbach, 1986; Canto-Pereira et al, 2007), we hypothesized that ethanol-challenged subjects would, compared to their performance in a no-alcohol control condition, exhibit decreased precision in their bisection judgments.…”