a tw in study of non-alcohol substance abuse.pdfVIP

PSYCHIATRY RESEARCH FLSEVIER Psychiatry Research 56 (1995) 2 13-220 A twin study of non-alcohol substance abuse Lynn M. Gynther*a, Gregory Careya, Irving I. Gottesmanb, George P. Vogler” ‘Institute f or Behavioral Genetics, Campus Box 44 7, University of Colorado, Boulder. CO 80309-044 7. USA bDepartment of Psychology, University of Virg inia, Charlottesville, VA 22901, USA ‘Division of Biostatistics, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, M O 63110. USA Received 25 February 1994; accepted 22 June 1994 Abstract Except for alcohol abuse, little is known about the familial aggregation for substance abuse. Here we report twin resemblance for non-alcohol substance use in the Washington University Twin Series, wherein probands were iden- tified by consecutive admission to psychiatric facilities in the St. Louis area. A 5-point substance abuse scale was con- structed with values anchored by never used drugs (1) to drug dependence (5). Year of birth was the most powerful predictor of drug use - younger twins scored far higher than older twins. Either heritability or common environment had to be included in the regression model to avoid a significant drop in explained variance, but which was more impor- tant could not be resolved. The correlation for identical twins exceeded that for fraternal twins, suggesting the possibili- ty of a heritable factor. Keywords: Drug dependence; G