Five years of renewal funding are sought to study the etiology of alcoholism from a developmental behavioral genetic perspective. We hypothesize that an inherited predisposition to alcoholism may be expressed in early adolescence as 1) personality characteristics, 2) psychophysiological markers, and 3) psychiatric disorder. Our findings to date indicate that these factors are a) strongly heritably, b) differentiate individuals with and without alcoholism, c) differentiate individuals with and without an alcoholic parent, and d) prospectively predict the early initiation of alcohol use in middle adolescence and early onset alcoholism in late adolescence. We have also found support for our hypotheses 2) that these phenotypic markers of liability influence alcoholism risk in part by increasing the likelihood that an individual is both exposed to and affected by experimental risk factors during adolescence, and 2) that gender may moderate the association between liability markers, environmental risk factors, and an alcoholic outcome. During the first six years of funding, 717 families consisting of a twin pair and their parents have completed a day-long, comprehensive assessment of their 1) mental health and substance use history, 2) personality (positive and negative emotionality and behavioral constraint), 3) psychophysiological markers (including brain potentials [P3 and EEG], ANS measures, eye-blink startle, and eye tracking), and 3) environmental factors (including family climate, peer group, and cognitive risk factors). At study intake, the twins were either age 11 (an age prior to experimentation with alcohol and drugs) or age 17 (an age that precedes the adoption of adult drinking patterns). At the time of renewal, two-thirds of these families will have completed their first in-person follow-up (FU1) assessment three years after study intake. During the next five years we propose to 1) complete FU1 (when the twins are 14 and 20), 2) initiate and complete FU2 (at ages 17 and 23), 3) initiate FU3 (at ages 20 and 26), 4) ascertain and complete intake assessments on an additional 200 families of 11 year old twins to increase ethnic diversity and statistical power, and 5) analyze the intake and FU data, comparing it to our parallel study of 666 male twin families. The primary analyses to be undertaken during this funding period involve: 1) assessing the effects of parental alcoholism, 2) univariate biometric analyses of the twin data, 3) multivariate biometric analyses aimed at exploring genotype-environment correlation, and 4) analysis of genotype-environment interaction effects.

Agency
National Institute of Health (NIH)
Institute
National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA)
Type
Research Project (R01)
Project #
5R01AA009367-08
Application #
6124042
Study Section
Health Services Research Review Subcommittee (AA)
Program Officer
Bryant, Kendall
Project Start
1992-09-01
Project End
2003-11-30
Budget Start
1999-12-01
Budget End
2000-11-30
Support Year
8
Fiscal Year
2000
Total Cost
$632,740
Indirect Cost
Name
University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Department
Psychology
Type
Schools of Arts and Sciences
DUNS #
168559177
City
Minneapolis
State
MN
Country
United States
Zip Code
55455
Elkins, Irene J; Saunders, Gretchen R B; Malone, Stephen M et al. (2018) Mediating pathways from childhood ADHD to adolescent tobacco and marijuana problems: roles of peer impairment, internalizing, adolescent ADHD symptoms, and gender. J Child Psychol Psychiatry 59:1083-1093
Harper, Jeremy; Malone, Stephen M; Iacono, William G (2018) Conflict-related medial frontal theta as an endophenotype for alcohol use disorder. Biol Psychol 139:25-38
Elkins, Irene J; Saunders, Gretchen R B; Malone, Stephen M et al. (2018) Associations between childhood ADHD, gender, and adolescent alcohol and marijuana involvement: A causally informative design. Drug Alcohol Depend 184:33-41
Samek, Diana R; Hicks, Brian M; Durbin, Emily et al. (2018) Codevelopment Between Key Personality Traits and Alcohol Use Disorder From Adolescence Through Young Adulthood. J Pers 86:261-282
Park, Jun Young; Wu, Chong; Basu, Saonli et al. (2018) Adaptive SNP-Set Association Testing in Generalized Linear Mixed Models with Application to Family Studies. Behav Genet 48:55-66
Bornovalova, Marina A; Verhulst, Brad; Webber, Troy et al. (2018) Genetic and environmental influences on the codevelopment among borderline personality disorder traits, major depression symptoms, and substance use disorder symptoms from adolescence to young adulthood. Dev Psychopathol 30:49-65
Lee, James J; McGue, Matt; Iacono, William G et al. (2018) The accuracy of LD Score regression as an estimator of confounding and genetic correlations in genome-wide association studies. Genet Epidemiol 42:783-795
Foster, Katherine T; Arterberry, Brooke J; Iacono, William G et al. (2018) Psychosocial functioning among regular cannabis users with and without cannabis use disorder. Psychol Med 48:1853-1861
Waldron, Jordan Sparks; Malone, Stephen M; McGue, Matt et al. (2018) A Co-Twin Control Study of the Relationship Between Adolescent Drinking and Adult Outcomes. J Stud Alcohol Drugs 79:635-643
Korotana, Laurel M; von Ranson, Kristin M; Wilson, Sylia et al. (2018) Reciprocal Associations Between Eating Pathology and Parent-Daughter Relationships Across Adolescence: A Monozygotic Twin Differences Study. Front Psychol 9:914

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