1 May 2019 | Volume 10 | Article 274 ORIGINAL RESEARCH doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2019.00274 published: 15 May 2019 Frontiers in Psychiatry | www.frontiersin.org Edited by: Hamed Ekhtiari, Laureate Institute for Brain Research, United States Reviewed by: Diana Martinez, Columbia University, United States Tara Rezapour, Tehran University, Iran *Correspondence: Lee Hogarth l.hogarth@exeter.ac.uk Specialty section: This article was submitted to Addictive Disorders, a section of the journal Frontiers in Psychiatry Received: 11 October 2018 Accepted: 10 April 2019 Published: 15 May 2019 Citation: Hogarth L, Hardy L, Bakou A, Mahlberg J, Weidemann G, Cashel S and Moustafa AA (2019) Negative Mood Induction Increases Choice of Heroin Versus Food Pictures in Opiate-Dependent Individuals: Correlation With Self-Medication Coping Motives and Subjective Reactivity. Front. Psychiatry 10:274. doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2019.00274 Negative Mood Induction Increases Choice of Heroin Versus Food Pictures in Opiate-Dependent Individuals: Correlation With Self-Medication Coping Motives and Subjective Reactivity Lee Hogarth 1 *, Lorna Hardy 1 , Alexandra Bakou 1 , Justin Mahlberg 2 , Gabrielle Weidemann 2,3 , Sharon Cashel 2 and Ahmed A. Moustafa 2,3 1 School of Psychology, University of Exeter, Exeter, United Kingdom, 2 School of Social Sciences and Psychology, Western Sydney University, Sydney, NSW, Australia, 3 MARCS Institute for Brain, Behaviour and Development, Western Sydney University, Sydney, NSW, Australia Acute growth in negative affect is thought to play a major role in triggering relapse in opiate- dependent individuals. Consistent with this view, three lab studies have demonstrated that negative mood induction increases opiate craving in opiate-dependent individuals. The current study sought to confirm these effects with a behavioral measure of heroin seeking, and test whether the effect is associated with self-reported opiate use to cope with negative affect and subjective reactivity to mood induction. Participants were heroin- dependent individuals engaged with treatment services (n = 47) and control participants (n = 25). Heroin users completed a questionnaire assessing reasons for using heroin: negative affect, social pressure, and cued craving. Baseline heroin choice was measured by preference to enlarge heroin versus food thumbnail pictures in two-alternative forced- choice trials. Negative mood was then induced by depressive statements and music before heroin choice was tested again. Subjective reactivity was indexed by negative and positive mood reported at the pre-induction to post-test timepoints. Heroin users chose heroin images more frequently than controls overall ( p = .001) and showed a negative mood-induced increase in heroin choice compared to control participants (interaction p < .05). Mood-induced heroin choice was associated with self-reported heroin use to cope with negative affect ( p < .05), but not social pressure ( p = .39) or cued craving ( p = .52), and with subjective mood reactivity ( p = .007). These data suggest that acute negative mood is a trigger for heroin seeking in heroin-dependent individuals, and this effect is pronounced in those who report using heroin to cope with negative affect, and those who show greater subjective reactivity to negative triggers. Interventions should seek to target negative coping motives to build resilience to affective triggers for relapse. Keywords: negative mood induction, coping motives, heroin-seeking behavior, opiate dependence, vulnerability