The age at which alcohol consumption by young adults begins is reported to be ever decreasing. Recent surveys indicate that over 10% of 13- year olds use alcohol and about 70% of high schoolers consume alcohol more than once per month. Of these individuals, nearly one-third report binge drinking (defined as consuming more than 5 drinks per occasion) on a weekly basis. In light of these astonishing statistics, our lack of understanding about the underlying causes of adolescent-onset drinking is surprising as well as disturbing. The largest amount of data on this topic has come from studies using selectively bred strains of rodents showing a clear genetic determinant of alcoholism. However, it is also recognized that genetics alone cannot account for the prevalence of alcohol abuse. Experiential factors must also act, either alone or in concert with genetic predisposition. Due to the early age of onset of alcohol consumption patterns, it is likely that experiences with alcohol occurring early in life contribute to later acceptance of this drug. The long-term objective of the proposed research plan is to understand more fully the mechanisms, behavioral and neurochemical, through which socially mediated increases in ethanol preferences are acquired by preweanling and periadolescent rats. The research will build upon a paradigm recently developed by the PI for rapidly inducing ethanol preferences in preweanling and periadolescent rats. Briefly, one animal (demonstrator) is intragastrically administered a dose of ethanol shortly before a 30-min period of behavioral interaction with the experimental subject (observer). In several experiments we have shown that observers subsequently increase their ethanol intake by up to 75-150% over control levels. Our working hypothesis is that observers detect respired ethanol cues on the breath of the demonstrator in the presence of an endogenous carbon based constituent of rat breath (carbon disulfide), and carbon disulfide promotes the release of endogenous opioids that serve functionally as the reinforcer for the conditioning of preferences for ethanol. To test this hypothesis, we will examine the role of endogenous opioids in promoting the increased ethanol intake patterns through pharmacologically manipulating primarily mu and kappa opioid receptors. The end result of this work will be an increased understanding of the neurochemical and behavioral factors underlying social acquisition of ethanol preferences.

Agency
National Institute of Health (NIH)
Institute
National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA)
Type
Research Project (R01)
Project #
5R01AA012466-05
Application #
6752958
Study Section
Special Emphasis Panel (ZAA1-EE (02))
Program Officer
Witt, Ellen
Project Start
2000-06-01
Project End
2005-05-31
Budget Start
2004-06-01
Budget End
2005-05-31
Support Year
5
Fiscal Year
2004
Total Cost
$92,716
Indirect Cost
Name
College of William and Mary
Department
Psychology
Type
Schools of Arts and Sciences
DUNS #
074762238
City
Williamsburg
State
VA
Country
United States
Zip Code
23187
Hunt, Pamela S; Richardson, Rick (2007) Pharmacological dissociation of trace and long-delay fear conditioning in young rats. Neurobiol Learn Mem 87:86-92
Hunt, Pamela S; Barnet, Robert C; Shea, Meghan E et al. (2006) Cholinergic modulation of trace conditioning trained in serial compound: A developmental analysis. Neurobiol Learn Mem 86:311-21
Hunt, Pamela S (2006) Neonatal treatment with a competitive NMDA antagonist results in response-specific disruption of conditioned fear in preweanling rats. Psychopharmacology (Berl) 185:179-87
Barnet, Robert C; Hunt, Pamela S (2005) Trace and long-delay fear conditioning in the developing rat. Learn Behav 33:437-43
Woolfrey, Kevin M; Musisca, Nicholas J; Hunt, Pamela S et al. (2005) Early postnatal ethanol administration does not affect prepulse inhibition in rats. Physiol Behav 84:747-52
Woolfrey, Kevin M; Hunt, Pamela S; Burk, Joshua A (2005) Postnatal ethanol exposure disrupts signal detection in adult rats. Neurotoxicol Teratol 27:815-23
Hunt, Pamela S; Morasch, Katherine C (2004) Modality-specific impairments in response habituation following postnatal binge ethanol. Neurotoxicol Teratol 26:451-9
Yttri, Eric A; Burk, Joshua A; Hunt, Pamela S (2004) Intermittent ethanol exposure in adolescent rats: dose-dependent impairments in trace conditioning. Alcohol Clin Exp Res 28:1433-6
Hunt, Pamela S; Phillips, Jessicah S (2004) Postnatal binge ethanol exposure affects habituation of the cardiac orienting response to an olfactory stimulus in preweanling rats. Alcohol Clin Exp Res 28:123-30
Hallmark, Rachel A; Hunt, Pamela S (2004) Social learning about ethanol in preweanling rats: role of endogenous opioids. Dev Psychobiol 44:132-9

Showing the most recent 10 out of 12 publications