Experiential Avoidance and Psychoactive Substance Use: Systematic Review.

ABSTRACT: Background: Experiential avoidance (EA) refers to the tendency to evade or suppress unpleasant internal experiences, such as distressing thoughts, emotions, or bodily sensations. Increasing evidence indicates that EA plays a central role in the onset and maintenance of addictive behaviours. Objective: To synthesise quantitative evidence on the association between experiential avoidance (EA), operationalised as psychological inflexibility, and psychoactive substance use (PSU) outcomes, including substance use frequency/quantity, craving, dependence severity, relapse/abstinence, and treatment response, and to characterise putative pathways (EA as predictor/mediator) and correlates (e.g., affect regulation and trauma-related factors). Methods: A systematic search was cond

SUBMITTER: Sequeda G 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12939156 | biostudies-literature | 2026 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature