Dataset Information

High-Intensity Drinking in Adult Australian Twins.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Many adult drinkers consume far beyond the binge threshold. This "high-intensity drinking" (HID), defined as 2 (HID-2) and 3 (HID-3) times the binge threshold, is of public health interest due to its role in acute alcohol-related harms. Research on HID has mostly been limited to college-aged young adults, focused on contextual factors, and neglected the potential role of genetic influences on the propensity to engage in HID.

Methods

Structured diagnostic interviews assessing past-year alcohol involvement were conducted with 3,785 individuals (1,365 men, 2,420 women; M_age = 32, range = 21 to 46), including 3,314 twins and 471 nontwin siblings from the Australian Twin Registry. Multinomial logistic regression analyses were conducted to compare HID-2 and HID-3 to binge drinking on demographic correlates, drinking characteristics, and drinking-related consequences. Biometric modeling was conducted to estimate the role of genetic, common, and individual-specific environmental factors in HID propensity.

Results

Among past-year drinkers, the prevalence of HID-2 and HID-3 was both 22%, with men disproportionally represented. The frequencies of drinking, intoxication, and binge drinking significantly increased across the heavier drinking categories, which also evidenced higher average consumption quantities and higher rates of alcohol-related consequences. The propensity to engage in HID was significantly heritable (A = 37% [95% CI: 28 to 46%]), with individual-specific environmental influences accounting for the remainder of the variance.

Conclusions

This study convincingly demonstrates that HID is not restricted to college-aged young adults, but also can be highly prevalent among those of working age, and that the propensity to engage in HID is partially explained by genetic influences.

SUBMITTER: Dash GF

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7328689 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

High-Intensity Drinking in Adult Australian Twins.

Dash Genevieve F GF Davis Christal N CN Martin Nicholas G NG Statham Dixie J DJ Lynskey Michael T MT Slutske Wendy S WS

Alcoholism, clinical and experimental research 20200113 2

<h4>Background</h4>Many adult drinkers consume far beyond the binge threshold. This "high-intensity drinking" (HID), defined as 2 (HID-2) and 3 (HID-3) times the binge threshold, is of public health interest due to its role in acute alcohol-related harms. Research on HID has mostly been limited to college-aged young adults, focused on contextual factors, and neglected the potential role of genetic influences on the propensity to engage in HID.<h4>Methods</h4>Structured diagnostic interviews asse ...[more]

PMID: 31943258

Similar Datasets

Project description:Adolescent alcohol abuse is associated with adverse outcomes in early adulthood, but differences in familial status and structure and household and community environments correlate with both adolescent drinking and adverse adult outcomes and may explain their association. We studied drinking-discordant twin pairs to evaluate such confounds to ask: Will between-family associations replicate in within-family comparisons?With longitudinal data from >3,000 Finnish twins, we associated drinking problems at age 18½ with 13 outcomes assessed at age 25; included were sustained substance abuse, poor health, physical symptoms, early coital debut, multiple sexual partners, life dissatisfaction, truncated education, and financial problems. We assessed associations among twins as individuals with linear regression adjusted for correlated observations; within-family analyses of discordant twin pairs followed, comparing paired means for adult outcomes among co-twins discordant for adolescent problem drinking. Defining discordance by extreme scores on self-reported problem drinking at age 18½ permitted parallel analyses of twins as individuals and discordant twin pairs. Alternate definitions of pair-wise discordance and difference score correlations across the entire twin sample yielded supplementary analyses.All individual associations were highly significant for all definitions of discordance we employed. Depending on definitions of discordance, 11 to 13 comparisons of all drinking-discordant twin pairs and 3 to 6 comparisons of discordant monozygotic (MZ) twin pairs replicated between-family associations. For most outcomes, effect size attenuated from individual-level analysis to that within discordant MZ twin pairs providing evidence of partial confounding in associations reported in earlier research. The exception was the General Health Questionnaire (GHQ); at age 25, GHQ-12 had equivalent associations with age 18½ Rutgers Alcohol Problem Index across all comparisons.Our analyses control for shared family background, and, partly or fully, for shared genes, to yield within-family replications and more compelling evidence than previously available that adolescent alcohol abuse disrupts transitions into early adulthood.

Project description:Importance:The prevalence of high-intensity binge drinking (HIBD), defined as consuming 2 or more times the binge threshold defined by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), is rapidly increasing in the United States. While the relationship between alcohol consumption and lipid and liver function enzyme (LFT) biomarkers has been previously examined, the associations of HIBD with those biomarkers remain unknown. Objective:To examine associations of HIBD with lipid and LFT levels in a cross-sectional sample enriched with participants who engage in HIBD. Design, Setting, and Participants:Cross-sectional study using data from the NIAAA clinical sample collected from March 3, 2005, to August 21, 2017, with participants recruited for either the NIAAA screening protocols or inpatient alcohol treatment program. For this study, participants were stratified by self-reported alcohol consumption into 4 sex-specific binge levels: nonbinge and 1, 2, and 3 or more times the binge threshold (levels I, II, and III). Multivariable analyses examined the odds of clinically high levels of lipids and LFTs across binge levels. Analyses were performed from December 3, 2018, to January 30, 2019. Main Outcomes and Measures:Serum levels of high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, total cholesterol, triglycerides, alanine aminotransferase, aspartate aminotransferase, and ?-glutamyltransferase. Results:A total of 2065 participants underwent protocol screening; 1519 with data available on alcohol consumption, body mass index, lipid levels, and LFT levels were included in the final analyses. Mean (SD) age was 39.7 (12.1) years; mean (SD) body mass index was 26.6 (5.1); 978 (64.4%) were male; 718 (47.3%) were white; and 578 (31.1%) consumed alcohol at the nonbinge level, 321 (21.2%) at level I, 239 (15.7%) at level II, and 318 (25.1%) at level III. High-intensity binge drinking was associated with 2- to 8-fold increased odds for clinically high levels of HDL-C, total cholesterol, triglycerides, and all LFTs (eg, for HDL-C: level III odds ratio [OR], 8.65; 95% CI, 4.75-15.77 and for ?-glutamyltransferase: level III OR, 8.21; 95% CI, 5.90-11.43). Increased HIBD frequency (days consuming at levels II and III) was associated with increased odds for clinically high levels of HDL-C, total cholesterol, and all LFTs (per unit increase in days consuming at the respective binge level) (eg, for HDL-C: level II OR, 1.025; 95% CI, 1.014-1.036 and level III OR, 1.033; 95% CI, 1.019-1.047 and for ?-glutamyltransferase: level II OR, 1.028; 95% CI, 1.019-1.037 and level III OR, 1.033; 95% CI, 1.019-1.047). Conclusions and Relevance:High-impact binge drinking was significantly associated with increased odds for clinically high levels of lipids and LFTs. Given that HIBD is increasingly common among US adults, targeted interventions aimed at reducing HIBD may have important health benefits.

Dataset Information

High-Intensity Drinking in Adult Australian Twins.

Background

Methods

Results

Conclusions

Publications

High-Intensity Drinking in Adult Australian Twins.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets