Component III - Stress-Related College Drinking: Learned and Genetic VulnerabilitiesThe proposed study will examine simultaneously the roles of learned and genetic risk factors for collegestudent drinking in response to stress- and affect-related triggers. Specifically, we will evaluate how sociallylearnedvulnerabilities, such as beliefs and motivations regarding the calming effects of drinking, as well asgenetic vulnerabilities, including genes related to serotonin function, serve as diatheses for engaging instress- and negative affect-related drinking (SNAD). Our proposed study will model SNAD processes at twolevels. At the MACRO-LEVEL, we will examine how learned and genetic vulnerabilities interplay with majorlife stressors (i.e., early family environment, traumatic encounters, and negative life events) to influenceaverage drinking outcomes and abuse/dependent symptoms among college students. At the MICROLEVEL,we will examine how learned and genetic vulnerabilities interplay with daily stressors and negativeaffect states to influence drinking, alcohol abuse/dependence symptoms, and coping-related drinking on aday-to-day basis among college students. To address these aims, we will employ an innovative Internetreporting system to (a) administer one-time measures of social learning risk factors, major life stressors, andaverage alcohol abuse/dependence symptoms and (b) track daily stress, affect, and alcohol use during a 30-day period among 1600 college students. This close to real-time data collection technique will minimizememory biases, thereby providing robust and reliable reports of daily alcohol use and related experiences.Saliva will be collected and DNA isolated and genotyped for carefully selected candidate genes, includingthe serotonin transporter gene-linked polymorphism (5-HTTLPR) and other genes identified as potentiallyimportant risk factors for engaging in stress-related drinking. The proposed study is the first to examine howsocial learning and genetic vulnerabilities together contribute to both drinking levels in response to major lifestressors and day-to-day drinking patterns in response to proximal daily stressors. This project will providegreater understanding of the factors that engender maladaptive drinking behaviors in a college-studentpopulation, which will potentially inform preventive and treatment interv
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