Preliminary studies have identified a number of phenomena which provide a potential link between research using animal models, and ethanol effects on human emotional behaviors. These phenomena may have a common mechanism in ethanol-based changes in anxiety, which is the focus for the proposed program. This program will determine the effects of varying levels of ethanol on a new, ethologically-derived analysis of anxiety which provides measures of freezing and movement inhibition; flight and avoidance; risk assessment; and, the suppression of nondefensive behaviors. The patterns of ethanol effects will be measured to both social and predatory threat stimuli, and, compared to profiles for an anxiolytic compound, Diazepam, to provide an extensive base for evaluation of the anxiolytic properties of ethanol. The relationship between these ethanol-based anxiety changes and specific alterations in the magnitude, targeting, and situational determinants of offensive attack will enable evaluation of the role of anxiety in the effects of ethanol on aggression. An additional component of the program will evaluate the effects of perinatal ethanol exposure on emotional behaviors. Finally, both individual differences in anxiety and, situational determinants of anxiety will be examined in terms of the hypothesis that anxiolytic properties of ethanol provide a mechanism for increased voluntary ethanol consumption under conditions of social and nonsocial stress. These studies should thus provide a detailed experimental analysis of the interactive relationship between ethanol, changes in anxiety, and voluntary ethanol consumption.
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