Latest Published Work

Here are some highlights of our recent published research and other scholarly work. Please contact us for additional information about our many other publications.

 

Understanding how treatments for adolescent substance use work: Current status and new directions

Samuel Meisel, Melissa Pielech, Molly Magill, Kelsey Sawyer, & Robert Miranda Jr.

A new systematic review by our team summarizes over 20 years of clinical trial research focused on uncovering how treatments for adolescent alcohol and other drug use produce their beneficial effects. This work, published in the leading scientific journal Clinical Psychology: Science and Practice, organized findings using the classification system put forth by the National Institutes of Health Science of Behavior Change (SOBC) program. We found the most consistent support for self-regulation and mixed support for interpersonal and social processes, and findings suggest less support for mediators of marijuana use outcomes relative to alcohol and multiple drug outcomes. The quality of prior studies was generally poor, however, which dampened our ability to draw any strong conclusions. This work highlights the need for systematic efforts to studying mediators of adolescent substance use treatment. Adoption of experimental medicine framework and a clearly articulated ontology of treatment mediators, can provide a unified methodology to understanding how adolescent substance use treatments work and inform clinical practice and guide intervention refinement.

Combined pharmacotherapy and evidence-based psychosocial cannabis treatment for youth reduces selection of cannabis-using friends

Samuel Meisel, Hayley Treloar Padovano, & Robert Miranda Jr.

A new study from members of our team featured in Drug and Alcohol Dependence, an international scientific journal focused on drug, alcohol, and tobacco dependence, suggests that combining medication with an evidence-based psychosocial intervention disrupts youth peer-selection processes and that changing peer affiliations could be one mechanism by which treatments help you reduce their cannabis use.

Topiramate blunts associations between affect, craving, and marijuana use among youth the daily life

Noah Emery, Ryan Carpenter, Samuel Meisel, & Robert Miranda Jr.

New findings from one of our clinical trials suggests adolescents and young adults who on average experience lower levels of pleasant emotions consume greater amounts of cannabis and that topiramate, an anticonvulsant medication, appears to block this association. These findings may explain in part how the medication works to reduce cannabis use in youth. This work was published in Psychopharmacology, a international scientific journal focused on elucidating mechanisms by which drugs affect behavior.

Incubation of alcohol craving as it naturally occurs in a developmentally diverse sample of dependent and non-dependent drinkers

Hayley Treloar Padovano & Robert Miranda Jr.

Craving or the urge to drink alcohol is a common trigger for relapse. Preclinical research shows that, among alcohol-dependent animals, longer periods of abstinence enhance craving, especially in responses to the sight and smell of alcohol, and studies show similar effects in humans. A new study published in Addiction Biology, an international scientific journal focused on neuroscience research aimed toward advancing our understanding of aspects on the action of drugs of abuse and addictive processes, examined for the first time whether “incubation of craving” exists across ages, from adolescence through adulthood, and compared across individuals with and without alcohol dependence. Findings demonstrate that incubation of cue-elicited craving occurs in persons with alcohol dependence and applies regardless of the drinker’s age.

Day level changes in social contexts during youth marijuana use treatment

Samuel Meisel, Ryan Carpenter, Hayley Treloar Padovano & Robert Miranda Jr.

Social contexts play a critical role in marijuana use among youth. Yet our understanding of how social contexts change during treatment remains quite limited. A new study published in the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology showed that young people decreased their time spent with friends and siblings who use marijuana and increased their time with non-using friends or alone during treatment. Time with parents or non-using siblings was unchanged. Spending more time with friends or siblings who use was linked with greater cannabis craving and use. This research supports increased attention to youths’ changing social contexts to enhance treatment success.

Teens who identify as sexual minorities frequently encounter stigma and other minority stressors that elicit negative affect in their daily lives

Ethan Mereish, Robert Miranda Jr., Yang Liu, & David Hawthorne

Emotions play a key role in mental health and general well-being. Research shows that teens who identify as sexual minorities are especially prone to a host negative mood states compared to their heterosexual peers. A new study by our group leveraged daily diary assessment methods and revealed for the first time that stigma-related or other minority stressors confer significant risk for disruptions in affect and mood in the daily lives of sexual minority teens. Minority stressors related to teens’ other marginalized identities beyond their sexual identities, such a race or ethnicity, also triggered spikes in negative affect. Published in the Journal of Counseling Psychology, a leading publication by the American Psychological Association, this study underscores the need to tailor interventions to help adolescents to cope with negative affect specific to their sexual and other intersecting identities.

How adolescents’ working memory abilities relate to their alcohol craving in real-life contexts depends on biological sex

Hayley Treloar Padovano & Robert Miranda Jr.

Adolescence is characterized by heightened sensitivity to rewards, social influences, and stress that extends into the mid-twenties. In a recent study, our group leveraged mobile-assessment technology to examine whether alcohol cues, peers, and stress elicit alcohol craving among youth in daily life. Published in the international scientific journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence, this study found that on the whole, when youth were not drinking, they experienced heightened alcohol craving during stressful moments, while with their peers, and when faced with alcohol-related cues, such as the sight of an alcoholic beverage. For males but not females, greater capacity for cognitive control buffered against stress-induced alcohol craving in daily life. These findings suggest that sex-related differences in alcohol problems emerging in later adolescence could be influenced by the interplay of cognitive control and in-the-moment contextual factors.