Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Randomized Controlled Trial
. 2023 Oct;31(5):933-941.
doi: 10.1037/pha0000630. Epub 2022 Dec 8.

Polygenic risk for alcohol consumption and multisite chronic pain: Associations with ad lib drinking behavior

Affiliations
Randomized Controlled Trial

Polygenic risk for alcohol consumption and multisite chronic pain: Associations with ad lib drinking behavior

Kyle M White et al. Exp Clin Psychopharmacol. 2023 Oct.

Abstract

Interrelations between alcohol use disorder and chronic pain have received increasing empirical attention, and several lines of evidence support the possibility of shared genetic liability. However, research on the genetic contributions to the component processes of these complex and potentially overlapping phenotypes remains scarce. The goal of the present study was to test polygenic risk scores (PRSs) for alcohol consumption and multisite chronic pain as predictors of ad lib drinking behavior during an experimental taste test. PRSs were calculated for 209 pain-free, moderate-to-heavy drinkers (57.9% male; 63.6% White). Among White participants, the alcohol and chronic pain PRSs showed nominally significant (ps < .05) positive associations with the volume of alcohol consumed and peak blood alcohol concentration (BAC), respectively. However, associations did not survive correction for multiple comparisons. When stratifying results by experimental condition (between-subjects design: no-pain vs. pain), the alcohol PRS was significantly and negatively associated with the volume of alcohol poured, consumed, and peak BAC among Black participants randomized to the no-pain condition (all false discovery rate [FDR]p < .05). Conversely, the chronic pain PRS was significantly and positively associated with study outcomes among White participants in both the no-pain (alcohol consumed; FDRp = .037) and pain conditions (peak BAC; FDRp = .017). These findings lend partial support to the assertion that alcohol consumption in the laboratory is reflective of drinking behavior in naturalistic settings. This was also the first study to use a pain-related PRS to predict alcohol outcomes, which may be indicative of shared etiology between base and target traits. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

We have no conflicts of interest to declare.

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Association of drinks-per-week PRS with study outcomes, stratified by self-reported race. Note. Regressions covaried for gender, body mass index, average beer pleasantness, QFV classification, and experimental condition; * p < .05.
Figure 2.
Figure 2.
Association of chronic pain PRS with study outcomes, stratified by self-reported race. Note. Regressions covaried for gender, body mass index, average beer pleasantness, QFV classification, and experimental condition; * p < .05.
Figure 3.
Figure 3.
Association of drinks-per-week PRS with study outcomes, stratified by self-reported race and experimental condition. Note. Regressions covaried for gender, body mass index, average beer pleasantness, and QFV classification; * p < .05; # FDRp < .05.
Figure 4.
Figure 4.
Association of chronic pain PRS with study outcomes, stratified by self-reported race and experimental condition. Note. Regressions covaried for gender, body mass index, average beer pleasantness, and QFV classification; * p < .05; # FDRp < .05.

References

    1. Arendt-Nielsen L, & Andersen OK (2005). Capsaicin in human experimental pain models of skin, muscle and visceral sensitization. In Malmberg AB & Bley KR (Eds.), Turning up the Heat on Pain: TRPV1 Receptors in Pain and Inflammation (pp. 117–144): Birkhäuser Basel.
    1. Barr PB, Ksinan A, Su J, Johnson EC, Meyers JL, Wetherill L, Latvala A, Aliev F, Chan G, Kuperman S, Nurnberger J, Kamarajan C, Anokhin A, Agrawal A, Rose RJ, Edenberg HJ, Schuckit M, Kaprio J, & Dick DM (2020). Using polygenic scores for identifying individuals at increased risk of substance use disorders in clinical and population samples. Translational Psychiatry, 10(1), 1–9. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Cahalan D, Cisin IH, & Crossley HM (1969). American drinking practices: A national study of drinking behavior and attitudes. Monographs of the Rutgers Center of Alcohol Studies, 6, 260.
    1. Chatterjee N, Shi J, & García-Closas M (2016). Developing and evaluating polygenic risk prediction models for stratified disease prevention. Nature Reviews Genetics, 17(7), 392–406. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Choi SW, Mak TSH, & O’Reilly PF (2020). Tutorial: A guide to performing polygenic risk score analyses. Nature Protocols, 15(9), 2759–2772. - PMC - PubMed

Publication types