REVIEW article
Front. Adolesc. Med.
Sec. Addiction in Adolescents
This article is part of the Research TopicExecutive Functions, Reward Systems and Addiction in Adolescents and Young AdultsView all 12 articles
Reward and Executive Control Imbalances in Adolescence: Measurement and Implications for our Understanding of Alcohol Use
Provisionally accepted
- Department of Psychology, College of Liberal Arts, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, United States
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Heuristic models of adolescent development posit that differences in the maturational trajectories of reward versus executive control systems influence propensities toward adolescent risk-taking, including alcohol use engagement. However, most studies measure reward and control processes in isolation and do not consider their joint influences on outcomes of interest through the course of adolescent development. This theoretical review summarizes recent additive, interaction-based, and within-person models that have investigated the joint contributions of reward and executive control systems to adolescent alcohol use patterns. Importantly, based on theoretical and methodological grounds, longitudinal within-person assessments appear to provide the most valid assessment of the developmental imbalance between reward and executive control systems and its impacts on risk-taking behaviors. Findings indicate that developmental trajectories, in conjunction with individual variations in the extent and developmental change of imbalances, are associated with adolescent alcohol involvement. The literature is characterized by various limitations, including heterogeneity in construct conceptualization, measurement of predictors and outcomes, and age range of participants, which complicates interpretation. Moreover, there are numerous methodological constraints of additive and interaction models in the measurement of reward-control differences. Future research that carefully considers study design, construct measurement, and modeling approaches is needed. On theoretical and methodological grounds, it is recommended that these studies use within-person designs to quantify developmental imbalances and their associations with concurrent and prospective alcohol use patterns and that special effort be given to teasing apart the influences of developmental versus individual difference factors.
Keywords: adolescence, Dual systems, Executive Function, Reward sensitivity, substance use
Received: 26 Jun 2025; Accepted: 01 Dec 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Lozano Wun and Luciana. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Vanessa Lozano Wun
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