RACIAL STIGMA AND SUBSTANCE USE OUTCOMES AMONG AFRICAN AMERICAN EMERGING ADULTS: A REPLICATION AND EXTENSION

Abstract

The present dissertation employs cognitive neuroscience methods (EEG/ERP analyses) to replicate and extend a novel, cue-based paradigm developed to investigate underlying neural mechanisms involved in the immediate context of a racial stigma event. Racial discrimination is a chronic psychosocial stressor for African Americans associated with a broad range of deleterious physical and mental health outcomes, including increased rates of substance use, especially in emerging adults (Gibbons & Stock, 2017; Williams et al., 2019; Brondolo et al. 2009; Pascoe & Smart Richmann, 2009). Several studies have outlined this relationship between racial discrimination and risky behavior, but there are few lab-controlled, neuroscientific experimental paradigms that have examined this link. Discrimination has been shown to impair self-regulatory strategies and cognitive control processes; thus, we sought to leverage cognitive neuroscience approaches to assess the immediate response to a racial stigma event, and if these responses lead to changes in emotional processing, executive function, substance cue reactivity, and reward processing. The development of the primary racial-stigma, cue-focused task served as the basis for a current NIDA K08 DA053441-01A1; PI: Risco; Mentor: Bernat. The task builds on cue reactivity and substance use literature to assess stigma-related change in brain systems relevant to risk-taking vulnerability. We sought to replicate previous findings with this paradigm, as well as extend the assessment to substance cue reactivity. Succinctly, we sought to measure changes in affective and regulatory responding both during and after exposure to racial stigma cues, aligned with previous work (Risco, Butler et al., 2020, 2023, 2025), and newly assess the impact of these modulations on drug cue reactivity. In the replication, with a larger sample, and extension, we sought to assess neural underpinnings of the link between discrimination and substance use. Results revealed two separable groups with unique sensitivities to racial stigma cues, but after exposure, a similar responding across groups. In the extension to substance cues, results were inconclusive most likely due to characteristics of the sample (i.e. well-functioning, non-using). Overall, results address a dearth in health disparities research and providing a foundation for future research studying the inextricable link between racial discrimination and risk behavior.