Objectives ： Alcohol cue-reactivity is known to play an important role in alcohol dependence relapse. The purpose of this study was to investigate the alcohol cue-reactivity on alcoholdependent patients and its effects on interpersonal relationships and socialization. Methods ： This study involved thirty alcohol-dependent patients and thirty-one normal control subjects who were age and gender matched. We employed an eyetracking technique while the subjects performed visual tasks. We displayed both facial expression and alcohol-related pictures and examined the influence of alcohol visual stimuli on the perception and understanding of the specified facial expression. Results ： We found out that alcohol-dependent patients experienced difficulty perceiving and understanding the different facial expressions, such as happiness, sadness, anger, and disgust. It was observed that both alcohol-dependent and control participants looked at the facial expression pictures for a longer period of time compared to the alcohol-related images. However, the alcohol-dependent patients tended to initially look at the alcoholrelated pictures more often than their counterparts in control group. Conclusion ： We hypothesized that alcohol cue-reactivity may cause alcohol-dependent patients to crave alcohol visual stimuli and may interfere with the perception and understanding of facial expression, which are crucial for interpersonal relation ships and socialization.
INTRODUCTION
METHODS
RESULTS
DISCUSSIONS