The National Consortium on Alcohol and NeuroDevelopment in Adolescence (NCANDA): A Multisite Study of Adolescent Development and Substance Use

Abstract

Objective: During adolescence, neurobiological maturation occurs concurrently with social and interpersonal changes, including the initiation of alcohol and other substance use. The National Consortium on Alcohol and NeuroDevelopment in Adolescence (NCANDA) is designed to disentangle the complex relationships between onset, escalation, and desistance of alcohol use and changes in neurocognitive functioning and neuromaturation.

Method: A sample of 831 youth, ages 12-21 years, was recruited at five sites across the United States, oversampling those at risk for alcohol use problems. Most (83%) had limited or no history of alcohol or other drug use, and a smaller portion (17%) exceeded drinking thresholds. A comprehensive assessment of biological development, family background, psychiatric symptomatology, and neuropsychological functioning-in addition to anatomical, diffusion, and functional brain magnetic resonance imaging-was completed at baseline.

Results: The NCANDA sample of youth is nationally representative of sex and racial/ethnic groups. More than 50% have at least one risk characteristic for subsequent heavy drinking (e.g., family history, internalizing or externalizing symptoms). As expected, those who exceeded drinking thresholds (n = 139) differ from those who did not (n = 692) on identified factors associated with early alcohol use and problems.

Conclusions: NCANDA successfully recruited a large sample of adolescents and comprehensively assessed psychosocial functioning across multiple domains. Based on the sample's risk profile, NCANDA is well positioned to capture the transition into drinking and alcohol problems in a large portion of the cohort, as well as to help disentangle the associations between alcohol use, neurobiological maturation, and neurocognitive development and functioning.

Figure 1.

Recruitment overview across five data collection sites within the National Consortium on Alcohol and NeuroDevelopment in Adolescence (NCANDA) consortium. More than 7,500 individuals made initial contact or began screening, and sufficient screening was completed to make inclusion/exclusion decisions for 2,548 (i.e., “completed screens”). Exclusionary factors were assessed in a stepwise, prioritized order depicted in the figure from top to bottom such that individuals who were excluded because of higher order factors were not assessed on subsequent criteria. The enrolled sample (N = 831) includes (n = 692) non-/low (NON) drinkers and (n = 139) drinkers who exceeded thresholds (ET). MRI = magnetic resonance imaging.

Figure 2.

Prevalence of risk factors for alcohol use and problems, including alcohol use onset before age 15 (age of onset), family history of alcohol or other drug problems (FH), endorsement of externalizing symptoms (externalizing), and endorsement of internalizing symptoms (internalizing) for non-/low (NON) drinkers (n = 692) and drinkers who exceeded thresholds (ET; n = 139). Y-axis values represent the percentage of each group who endorsed risk factors.