Abstract
Background:
Neuroimaging studies of vulnerability to Alcohol Use Disorder (AUD)
have identified structural and functional variations which might reflect
inheritable features in alcohol-naïve relatives of AUD individuals (FH+)
compared to controls having no such family history (FH-). However, prior
research did not simultaneously account for childhood maltreatment, any
clinically significant disorder and maternal AUD. Therefore, we mainly
aimed to investigate the brain structure and reward-related neural
activations (fMRI), using whole-brain analysis in FH+ young adults with
no prevalent confounders.
Methods:
46 FH+ and 45 FH- male and female participants had no severe
childhood maltreatment exposure, neither any psychiatric disorder or
AUD, nor a prenatal exposure to maternal AUD. We used a 3 T MRI coupled
with a whole brain voxel-based method to compare between groups the grey
matter volumes and activations in response to big
versus small wins during a Monetary
Incentive Delay task. The Childhood Trauma Questionnaire score was used
as confounding variable in the analyses to account for the remaining
variance between groups.
Results:
Compared to FH- controls, FH+ participants had smaller grey matter
volumes in the frontal and cingulate regions as well as in the bilateral
nucleus accumbens and right insula. The FH+ participants’ fMRI datasets
denoted a blunted activation in the middle cingulum with respect to FH-
controls’ during the processing of reward magnitude, and a greater
activation in the anterior cingulum in response to anticipation of a
small win.
Conclusions:
Family history of alcohol use disorder is linked to structural and
functional variations including brain regions involved in reward
processes.
The role of pubertal timing in the link between family history of alcohol use disorder and late adolescent substance use
