Arpana Agrawal

..Alcohol use disorders (AUDs) and suicidal ideation (SI) co-occur, yet few studies have investigated the risk and protective factors that infl uence their comorbidity...

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..However, little is known of its genetic underpinnings - specifically, whether genetic influences on craving are distinct from those influencing DSM-IV alcohol dependence...

..The endocannabinoid system has been implicated in stress adaptation and the regulation of mood in rodent studies, but few human association studies have examined these links and replications are limited...

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..We also discuss respiratory harms associated with co-use of cannabis and tobacco, overlapping withdrawal syndromes and outline treatment implications for co-occurring use...

..In this review, we discuss the challenges associated with harmonizing alcohol-consumption data from studies with widely different assessment instruments, with a particular focus on large-scale genetic studies...

..With a focus on the classical twin design that utilizes data on monozygotic and dizygotic twins, we discuss support in favor of heritable influences on alcohol, nicotine, cannabis and other illicit drug dependence...

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..Despite accumulating evidence that there is a genetic basis for cannabis use disorders (ie, abuse and dependence), few studies have identified genomic regions that may harbor biological risk and protective factors...

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..Rates of DSM-IV cannabis use disorders in those with BD were 29.4% and were independently and significantly associated with increased suicide attempts, greater likelihood of mixed episodes and greater disability attributable to BD...

..Qualitative research suggests that a shared route of administration (i.e. via inhalation) for the common forms of both tobacco (i.e. cigarettes) and cannabis (i.e. joints) may contribute to their co-occurring use...

..05) and rs806380 (P = 0.009)]. Haplotype analyses revealed the association to be largely driven by the SNP rs806380. These results suggest a role for the cannabinoid receptor 1 gene in cannabis dependence...

..We examine whether cannabis use prior to age 17 years is associated with an increased likelihood of DSM-IV nicotine dependence and the extent to which genetic and environmental factors contribute to this association...

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..In this study, we examine whether age at first drink moderates genetic and environmental influences, via gene x environment interactions, on DSM-IV alcohol dependence symptoms...

..However, there is growing evidence that cannabis onset occurs later in life as well and little is known of the risk and protective influences that are associated with late-onset cannabis initiation...

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..The purpose of this study was to develop a quantitative measure of alcohol consumption for gene-mapping studies...

..There is considerable debate surrounding the effective measurement of DSM-IV symptoms used to assess manic disorders in epidemiological samples...

..In the present report, we extend the previous study by expanding our genotyping efforts significantly for these two genes...

..Given the high addictive potential of nicotine and the ubiquitous nature of cannabis use, this is a public health concern worthy of considerable attention...

..We examine mechanisms by which PSI influences the etiology of regular substance involvement (RSI), particularly in women...

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..In adolescent girls especially, rates of cannabis use have increased over the last decade, urging the need to characterize the potential correlates of onset of cannabis use during emerging adulthood...

..The genetic etiology of cannabis use, abuse and dependence has elicited significant interest from genetic epidemiologists...

..We investigated whether use and early-onset use of cigarettes, alcohol and cannabis contributed an increase in risk for initiation of subsequent psychoactive substances in women (N = 3729, mean age = 21.7)...

..In this study, we characterize patterns of cannabis and tobacco use (tobacco but not cannabis, cannabis but not tobacco or both) and compare the factors associated with onset of tobacco before cannabis and cannabis before tobacco...

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..We conclude that the criteria that serve as indicators of DSM-IV cannabis abuse and dependence do not function identically in men and women and that certain criteria (e.g. hazardous use) require further refinement...

..We examine the co-occurrence of abuse/dependence across different illicit drugs and test associations between these classes and major psychiatric disorders...

..However, little is known of the extent to which genetic and environmental influences contribute to individual differences in expectancies and motives...

..While replication is required, this study represents an important first step toward clarifying the biological underpinnings of cannabis dependence...

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..The goal of this study was to develop a factor score derived from measures of past-12-month alcohol consumption...

..0 on chromosome 2 (3.2, 234 cM), 10 (2.4 and 2.6 at 60 cM and 116 cM) and 13 (2.1 at 64 cM). These regions may harbor genes that contribute to the biological basis of alcohol and drug dependence...

..If there is evidence in its favor, the increased rates of cigarette smoking in cannabis users may prove to be the most significant public health problem associated with cannabis use...

..We used data on a previously defined alcohol consumption factor score in a sample of 827 young women to investigate association with 1,014 single-nucleotide polymorphisms in genes related to addiction...

..Our results also suggest that severe early trauma may prove to be an important clinical covariate in the treatment of alcohol dependence...

..A high genetic correlation between these measures would suggest that a continuous measure of consumption may have a useful role in the discovery of genes contributing to dependence risk...

..We tested whether alcohol, nicotine, and illicit drug use and dependence were associated with lifetime educational attainment after controlling for familial background characteristics...

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..The primary goal of the present analyses is to test hypotheses about the source(s) and magnitude of spousal associations for AD using a twin-spouse design...

..There was no association with other genes in the GABAA cluster on chromosome 4 with illicit drug dependence...

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..The objective of the current study was to examine the clustering of ED symptoms in a general population sample using latent class analysis (LCA)...

..Other studies have reported that chromosome 11 may harbor genes associated with various aspects of smoking behavior. This study adds to that literature by highlighting evidence for NW...

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..Differences in findings may also reflect a distinct etiological pathway for substance use initiation in African-American women that could not be detected in previous studies...

..11 and 1.16. Further dissection of the alcoholism phenotype, to disentangle the influence of comorbid substance-use disorders, will be a next step in identifying genetic variants associated with alcohol dependence...

..Incorporation of logically chosen interaction parameters, such as AOS, into genetic models of substance use disorders may increase the degree of explained phenotypic variation and constitutes a promising avenue for gene discovery...

..Additional research is needed to better characterize the environmental and genetic factors related to BMI in persons of different races to aid understanding of the complex determinants of body weight in individuals...

..The genetic contribution to liability for opioid dependence is well established; identification of the responsible genes has proved challenging...

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..Aggregation of population-level data may obscure important subgroup differences in patterns of illicit drug use and psychiatric comorbidity. Further exploration of a 'self-medicating' subgroup is needed...

..This article explores how this genetic risk factor interacts with marital status, another factor previously shown to be associated with the risk for alcohol dependence...

..Design Members of monozygotic and dizygotic, including unlike-sex twin pairs (n = 6257) from a young adult cohort from the Australian Twin Registry...

..Fine mapping of this linkage region may reveal variants contributing to heaviness of smoking, which will lead to a better understanding of the genetic mechanisms underlying nicotine dependence...

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..68%). These results indicate the important social influences that may occur for smoking initiation do not appear to seriously bias estimates of genetic effects on later stages of smoking...

..The authors tested for genetic linkage of DSM-IV-diagnosed major depressive disorder in families that were ascertained for cigarette smoking...

..In contrast to previous research, there is limited evidence for increased risk associated with early-onset use in this sample of Vietnam-era veterans...

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..To provide an overview of the genetic epidemiology of substance use and misuse in adolescents...

..Evidence from this and prior studies demonstrating withdrawal strongly suggest that future editions of DSM need to reconsider the exclusion of withdrawal from criteria for cannabis dependence...

..Individual components of compound criteria may differ in measurement properties; therefore pooling information from such divergent items will reduce information about the AUD construct...

..We aim to clarify the mechanisms contributing to spousal similarity for cigarette smoking and alcohol consumption...

..While both ND and SLEs have been studied extensively in relation to other variables, there are few instances in which they have been investigated in concert...

..Additional directions for research, including the incorporation of measured genes and the use of longitudinal designs, are proposed to further efforts to model the pathways from CSA to alcohol-related problems...

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..Are there risk factors that associate with illicit drug use or illicit drug abuse/dependence? Is the magnitude of the association the same for use and abuse/dependence? Does this pattern of association differ across categories of drugs?..

..Gateway and common liabilities models have been employed to explain this relationship. We sought to examine this association using a combination of the discordant twin design and modeling methods...

..These findings also reinforce the validity of composite variables in epidemiological and genetic research...

..Our analyses suggest that while there may be mean differences in the levels of depressive symptoms across sexes, the genetic and environmental factors that predispose males and females to depressive symptoms are not different...

..42 to .51 for dependence and from .31 to .51 for consumption. Consumption was significantly less heritable in the younger Phase 2 cohort (23-39 years) compared to the older Phase 1 cohort (28-90 years)...

..Overall, our results suggest that the use and abuse/dependence of cannabis and other illicit drugs are strongly linked via common risk factors that jointly influence their individual liabilities...

..NS was most closely related to cannabis use while N showed significant genetic overlap with sedative use. NS in males appears to be a good indicator of risk for cannabis use. This result may be useful for candidate gene studies...