Years of education may impact drinking behavior and risk of alcohol dependence
October 25, 2019
Science Daily/Springer
Higher educational attainment -- spending more years in education -- may impact people's drinking behaviour and reduce their risk of alcohol dependence, according to a study published in Molecular Psychiatry.
Alcohol consumption is a major risk factor for death and disability worldwide. Identifying factors associated with how much, how often and what people drink may be important for developing and improving intervention and treatment strategies. Previous studies have suggested that educational attainment may influence drinking, but with conflicting results.
To assess the possible effects of educational attainment on alcohol use behaviours and alcohol dependence, a team of researchers at the National Institutes of Health, USA used two -sample Mendelian randomisation statistical methods. The authors used genetic data generated by international genomics consortiums and examined a set of 53 genetic variants previously associated with differences in educational attainment, and their links with certain alcohol use behaviours. They tested which of the 53 variants associated with educational attainment in one study were present in the DNA of people who reported different alcohol use behaviours in the other study.
Dr Falk Lohoff, the corresponding author said: "Using data from a total of approximately 780,000 study participants, we found that genetic variants associated with an additional 3.61 years of schooling were associated with an approximately 50% reduced risk of alcohol dependence. The presence of genetic variants associated with educational attainment also affected the pattern of alcohol use and type of alcoholic beverage people consumed."
The authors showed that genetic variants associated with higher educational attainment were not associated with the total amount of alcohol people drank in a week, but with a reduced frequency of binge drinking (consuming six or more units of alcohol per session), frequency of memory loss due to drinking, total drinks consumed per drinking day and weekly intake of distilled spirits, beer and cider. The association with drinking fewer spirits was more pronounced in women than it was in men, while decreased average weekly beer plus cider intake was more pronounced in men than women.
Genetic variants associated with increased educational attainment were also associated with more frequent drinking in both men and women, with drinking alcohol with meals, especially in men, and with higher consumption of wine. Dr Lohoff said: "It is important to understand that while these genetic variants allow us to investigate the possible effect of educational attainment on alcohol consumption and alcohol dependence, this doesn't mean that educational attainment can't be modified. The possible effect of educational attainment on drinking that we show in this study, suggests that increasing educational attainment may be a useful target for prevention programs against problematic alcohol use, alcohol dependence, and their consequences."
The authors caution that as the genetic data examined in this study was obtained from people from Anglophone countries, the applicability of the findings to other countries may be limited. Replication of the findings using data from different countries and ethnicities is necessary.
As educational attainment only measures completed years of schooling, determining how various aspects of education differently impact alcohol consumption was not possible, but should be investigated in future studies, the authors add.
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/10/191025075838.htm
Trauma induces more alcohol craving than stress among veterans with PTSD and co-occurring alcohol dependence
July 1, 2016
Science Daily/Research Society on Alcoholism
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and alcohol dependence (AD) are two of the most common and debilitating disorders diagnosed among American military veterans. AD and PTSD often occur together, and this co-occurrence has a worse prognosis than either disorder alone. Alcohol craving is related to relapse, but the relationship between PTSD symptoms, craving, and relapse is not well understood. This study is the first to explore the effects of trauma-induced and stress-induced imagery on alcohol craving, affect, and cardiovascular and cortisol responses in a laboratory setting.
Researchers examined 25 veterans who had been diagnosed with AD and PTSD and were participating in a randomized treatment trial. At baseline, participants' PTSD symptoms and drinking quantity and frequency during the three-month pretreatment period were assessed. During the session, the participants were exposed to neutral, stressful, and traumatic imagery in random order. The main outcomes included craving, anxiety, mood states, salivary cortisol, and cardiovascular responses.
Both stress and trauma cues produced greater increases in craving, negative affect (anxiety, fear, anger), and cardiovascular reactivity when compared to neutral cues. Traumatic images produced significantly stronger craving for alcohol and greater cardiovascular reactivity than stressful images. Also, trauma-induced but not stress-induced craving was positively correlated with baseline levels of drinking. These findings are consistent with prior observations of a relationship between PTSD symptoms and alcohol relapse.
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/07/160701183421.htm
Vets' alcohol problems linked to stress on home front
July 31, 2014
Science Daily/Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health
Regardless of traumatic events experienced during deployment, returning National Guard soldiers were more likely to develop a drinking problem if faced with civilian life setbacks, including job loss, legal problems, divorce, and serious financial and legal problems -- all commonplace in military families. Researchers found having at least one civilian stressor or a reported incident of sexual harassment during deployment raised the odds of alcohol use disorders.
Alcohol abuse is a major concern for reservists returning home. Nearly 7% of Americans abuse or are dependent on alcohol, but among reserve soldiers returning from deployment, the rate of alcohol abuse is 14%, almost double that of the civilian population.
The study looked at a group of 1,095 Ohio National Guard soldiers who had primarily served in either Iraq or Afghanistan in 2008 and 2009. Over three years, the soldiers were interviewed three times via telephone and were asked about their alcohol use, exposure to deployment-related traumatic events and stressors like land mines, vehicle crashes, taking enemy fire, and witnessing casualties, and any stress related to everyday life since returning from duty.
More than half (60%) of the responding soldiers experienced combat-related trauma, 36% of soldiers experience civilian stressors, and 17% reported being sexually harassed during their most recent deployment. Among the group, 13% reported problems consistent with an alcohol use disorder in the first interview, 7% during the second, and 5% during the third. Alcohol use disorder is defined as alcohol abuse or dependence.
The researchers found having at least one civilian stressor or a reported incident of sexual harassment during deployment raised the odds of alcohol use disorders. The effect of the stressors was restricted to cases of new-onset alcohol use disorders, and wasn't seen among those with a history of problem drinking. In contrast, combat-related traumatic events were only marginally associated with alcohol problems.
The study highlights the important role civilian life and the accompanying stress plays in cases of alcohol use disorder in the National Guard.
"Exposure to the traumatic event itself has an important effect on mental health in the short-term, but what defines long-term mental health problems is having to deal with a lot of daily life difficulties that arise in the aftermath -- when soldiers come home," explains lead investigator Magdalena Cerdá, DrPH, MPH, assistant professor of Epidemiology at the Mailman School of Public Health. "The more traumatic events soldiers are exposed to during and after combat, the more problems they are likely to have in their daily life -- in their relationships, in their jobs -- when they come home. These problems can in turn aggravate mental health issues, such as problems with alcohol, that arise during and after deployment."
With high rates of alcohol abuse among soldiers, there is a critical need for targeted interventions to help soldiers handle stressful life events without alcohol, the investigators observe. More than 1.6 million service members have been deployed in support of war efforts Operation Enduring Freedom, Operation Iraqi Freedom, and Operation New Dawn.
"Guardsmen who return home need help finding jobs, rebuilding their marriages and families, and reintegrating into their communities," says Karestan Koenen, PhD, professor of Epidemiology at the Mailman School and senior author of the study. "Too many of our warriors fall through the cracks in our system when they return home. This is particularly true of Guardsmen who do not have the same access to services as regular military personnel. We need to support our soldiers on the home front just as we do in the war zone."
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/07/140731095005.htm