Association study of serotonin transporter gene regulatory region polymorphism and alcoholism

Previous studies have indicated associations between a functional biallelic repetitive element in the 5' regulatory region of the serotonin transporte r gene (5-HTTLPR) and alcoholic subjects who have either dissocial personal ity disorder or severe withdrawal symptoms. To replicate these associations under the hypothesis that genetic polymorphism plays some role in the susc eptibility or vulnerability of some subgroup of alcoholics, the association s between alcoholic subjects' genetic polymorphisms, clinical characteristi cs, and personalty traits were examined. This case control study comprised 697 alcoholic and 270 control subjects, A questionnaire focusing on family and social background, history of drinking and alcohol withdrawal, DSM-III- R criteria for the evaluation of psychiatric conditions, and Feighner's cri teria for the lifetime diagnosis and assessment of overall severity of alco holism was administered to 373 alcoholic subjects. Temperament and Characte r Inventory (TCI) and Sensation Seeking Scale (SSS) were used to evaluate t he other 324 alcoholics. The frequency of the homozygous short allele was s ignificantly higher in alcoholic binge drinkers than in nonbinge drinking a lcoholics, There were no significant differences in the frequencies of eith er the 5-HTTLPR genotype or the short vs, long allele in alcoholic and cont rol subjects, The alcoholics' 5-HTTLPR genotype and allele frequencies did not differ significantly by the severity of withdrawal symptoms or by the n umber of positive Feighner's diagnostic criteria. Although these results in dicate an association between 5-HTTLPR and a subgroup of alcoholics charact erized by binge drinking, the authors found no differences in SSS and TCI s ubscale scores for alcoholics with different 5-HTTLPR genotypes. Future stu dies of the association in other alcoholic population should take into acco unt personality traits. (C) 2001 Wiley-Liss, Inc.