Elizabeth Aston

About

Elizabeth R Aston is an Associate Professor (Research) in the Department of Behavioral and Social Sciences at Brown University. She received her Ph.D. in Neuroscience from Wake Forest School of Medicine in 2012, where her research focused on the estimation of breath alcohol concentration and simulated driving behavior among individuals who engage in heavy episodic drinking. Her research interests include examining predictors of cannabis use disorder severity among regular cannabis users and investigating the relative reinforcing value of cannabis through behavioral economic measures. Dr. Aston was awarded a K01 career development award from the National Institute on Drug Abuse to conduct qualitative and quantitative research aimed at modifying and validating a behavioral economic measure of cannabis demand. She joined Brown University to continue this research and to receive training in qualitative methods, laboratory marijuana administration methodology, behavioral economic theory, and advanced data analysis.

Research topics

• Medicine
• Psychiatry
• Clinical psychology
• Psychology
• Environmental health
• Microeconomics
• Biology
• Family medicine
• Economics

Selected publications

• Patterns of Cannabis and Alcohol Co-Use: Substitution Versus Complementary Effects

  Alcohol research · 2022 · 91 citations

  PURPOSE: The purpose of this review is to discuss the literature regarding the concurrent use (co-use) of alcohol and cannabis and competing hypotheses as to whether cannabis acts as a substitute for (i.e., replacing the effects of alcohol, resulting in decreased use) or a complement to (i.e., used to enhance the effects of alcohol, resulting in increased use) alcohol. The impact of cannabis use on alcohol-related outcomes has received increased attention in the wake of ongoing legalization of c…

  DOI

• Complex cannabis use patterns: Associations with cannabis consequences and cannabis use disorder symptomatology

  Addictive Behaviors · 2020 · 70 citations

  DOI

• Association of Substance Use With Behavioral Adherence to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Guidelines for COVID-19 Mitigation: Cross-sectional Web-Based Survey

  JMIR Public Health and Surveillance · 2021 · 19 citations

  BACKGROUND: Substance use is a risk factor for COVID-19 infection and adverse outcomes. However, reasons for elevated risk for COVID-19 in substance users are not well understood. OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to evaluate whether alcohol or other drug use is associated with adherence to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) guidelines for COVID-19 mitigation. Preregistered analyses tested the hypothesis that greater use of alcohol and other drugs would be associated with lower…

  PublisherDOI

• Cannabis Use Disorder: A Behavioral Economic Perspective

  Current Addiction Reports · 2022 · 14 citations

  1st authorCorresponding
  DOI

• Pain is associated with exclusive use and co-use of tobacco and cannabis: Findings from Wave 5 (2018–2019) of the Population Assessment of Tobacco and Health Study

  Addictive Behaviors · 2023-07-24 · 11 citations

  articleOpen access
  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Recent grants

• Behavioral Economic Analysis of Demand for Marijuana

  NIH · $902k · 2015–2021

• Administrative Core

  NIH · $34.9M · 2019–2029

Frequent coauthors

• Jane Metrik

  Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey

  128 shared

• James MacKillop

  St. Joseph’s Healthcare Hamilton

  70 shared

• Samantha G. Farris

  Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey

  58 shared

• Jasjit S. Ahluwalia

  Providence College

  30 shared

• Ana M. Abrantes

  24 shared

• Christopher W. Kahler

  Brown University

  23 shared

• Michael Amlung

  University of Kansas

  21 shared

• Jennifer E. Merrill

  20 shared

Education

• Ph.D.

  Wake Forest University

  2012

Awards & honors

• K01 career development award from the National Institute on…

Similar researchers at Brown University

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• Kate Careyh-100
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