- Inflicting greater harm judged to be less harmful September 9
- Low grades in adolescence linked to dopamine genes September 3
- Social networks influence health behaviors September 2
Archive for the ‘Alcoholism’ Category
Excessive drinking may lead to poor brain health via obesity
Prior research has shown that alcohol abuse and dependence are typically associated with higher rates of obesity, as evidenced by a high body mass index (BMI). Findings from a new study of the relationship between BMI and regional measures of brain structure, metabolite concentrations, and cerebral blood flow suggest that alcohol-related brain injuries may result from a complicated fusion of hazardous drinking, chronic cigarette smoking, and even elevated BMI.
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Sensitivity to alcohol odors may indicate a genetic predisposition to alcohol dependence
A study of responses to the aromas of alcoholic drinks according to subjects’ genotyping at a SNP in GABRA2 has found that this genotype can affect the brain’s reward responses to cues such as alcohol odors. Results will be published in the December 2010 issue of Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research and are currently available at Early View.
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School-based intervention successfully lowers drinking rates in at risk children
Researchers at King’s College London’s Institute of Psychiatry describe a successful personality-based intervention for substance abuse delivered by teachers in the September 2010 issue of the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.
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Chronic drinking can disrupt circadian rhythms
Circadian rhythmicity is regulated by circadian clock genes, and animal studies have shown that chronic drinking can alter expressions in these genes. A new study has found that significantly lower levels of messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) – a molecule of RNA that helps to manufacture proteins – in circadian clock genes in alcohol-dependent (AD) patients support a relationship between circadian clock gene dysregulation and drinking in humans.
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Alcohol dependence damages both episodic memory and awareness of memory
Alcohol dependence (AD) has negative effects on cognitive processes such as memory. Metamemory refers to the subjective knowledge that people have of their own cognitive processing abilities, such as their monitoring and control of memory. A new study has found that AD has a negative impact on both episodic memory as well as metamemory.
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Binge drinking increases death risk in men with high blood pressure
If you have high blood pressure, binge drinking may dramatically raise your risk of stroke or heart-related death, according to a South Korean study reported in Stroke: Journal of the American Heart Association.
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Scientists Find Genes That Influence Brain Wave Patterns
Scientists have identified new genes and pathways that influence an individual’s typical pattern of brain electrical activity, a trait that may serve as a useful surrogate marker for more genetically complex traits and diseases. One of the genes, for example, was found to be associated with alcoholism.
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Can I Buy You a Drink? Genetics May Determine Sensitivity to Other People’s Drinking Behavior
Your friend walks into a bar to meet you for happy hour. He sidles up to the bar and orders a drink–does that make you more likely to get a drink yourself? According to new findings reported in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, genetics may determine the extent to which you are influenced by social drinking cues — signals such as advertisements, drinks placed on a bar, and seeing other people around you drinking.
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As College Drinking Problems Rise, New Studies Identify Effective Prevention Strategies
Alcohol-related deaths among U.S. college students rose from 1,440 deaths in 1998 to 1,825 in 2005, along with increases in heavy drinking and drunk driving, according to an article in the July supplement of the Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs.
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Receptor Variant Influences Dopamine Response to Alcohol
A genetic variant of a receptor in the brain’s reward circuitry plays an important role in determining whether the neurotransmitter dopamine is released in the brain following alcohol intake, according to a study led by researchers at the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), part of the National Institutes of Health. Dopamine is involved in transmitting the euphoria and other positive subjective effects produced by alcohol.
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