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Category: Project

Description: Introduction: The Visual Probe Task (VPT) is a computerised task commonly used to measure attentional bias to substance-related stimuli. Despite concerns it demonstrates poor reliability and internal consistency little research has examined its psychometric properties. These issues can reduce confidence in inferences based on VPT performance. As such, we attempted to improve the reliability of the alcohol VPT, by attempting to apply empirical recommendations for outlier handling and task design from the anxiety literature. Methods: We reanalysed data from three previously published studies in our laboratory and three newly collected data sets. We compared tasks which presented images on the left and right of the screen to above and below, whether participants responded to the location of the probe or the content, and whether general alcohol-related images or images personalised to the individual were used. In each VPT we also applied a-priori outlier removal (2 and 3 standard deviations and median absolute difference) and data-driven outlier removal (Winsorising). Results: Across all studies and tasks internal consistency and test-retest reliability of attentional bias measures were inadequate. There was no consistent improvement in internal consistency or rest-retest reliability as a function of outlier removal methods. Discussion: We were unable to demonstrate adequate reliability of the alcohol VPT, which further supports observations that these tasks may not yield reliable measures. Future research should focus on improving the reliability of these tasks or abandoning them in favour of more reliable alternatives