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High‐risk social drinkers and heavy drinkers display similar rates of alcohol consumption
Author(s) -
Sloan Matthew E.,
Gowin Joshua L.,
Janakiraman Roshni,
Ester Corbin D.,
Stoddard Joel,
Stangl Bethany,
Ramchandani Vijay A.
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
addiction biology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.445
H-Index - 78
eISSN - 1369-1600
pISSN - 1355-6215
DOI - 10.1111/adb.12734
Subject(s) - alcohol consumption , heavy drinking , consumption (sociology) , environmental health , alcohol , psychology , medicine , demography , social psychology , human factors and ergonomics , poison control , biology , sociology , biochemistry , social science
Alcohol consumption is often assessed over weeks to months, but few attempts have been made to characterize alcohol consumption rates at the level of an individual drinking session. Here, we aimed to compare the rate of alcohol consumption in social drinkers at high risk for alcohol use disorder (AUD) and heavy drinkers. One hundred and sixty social drinkers and 48 heavy drinkers participated in an alcohol self‐administration study. Social drinkers were classified as low risk or high risk for AUD based on sex, impulsivity, and family history of alcoholism. Participants received a priming dose of intravenous alcohol to assess alcohol‐induced craving and completed a 125‐minute intravenous alcohol self‐administration session to assess rate of achieving a binge‐level exposure (blood alcohol concentration greater than or equal to 80 mg%). There were no differences between rates of binging in high‐risk and heavy drinkers (hazard ratio = 0.87; 95% CI, 0.48‐1.56). Heavy drinkers reported higher levels of craving than high‐risk and low‐risk drinkers at baseline. However, following a priming dose of alcohol, there were no longer differences in craving between high‐risk and heavy drinkers. These results indicate that high‐risk social drinkers demonstrate binging behavior that is similar to heavy drinkers, which may be driven by alcohol‐induced craving. Prospective studies are needed to elucidate whether these patterns of craving and consumption in high‐risk social drinkers are predictive of future AUD.