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Risk factors for alcoholism

Last reviewed dd mmm yyyy. Last edited dd mmm yyyy

Authoring team

There is no single factor that accounts for the variation in individual risk of developing alcohol-use disorders. The evidence suggests that harmful alcohol use and alcohol dependence have a wide range of causal factors

  • family history
    • offspring of parents with alcohol dependence are four times more likely to develop alcohol dependence
    • genetic studies (particularly those in twins) has clearly demonstrated a genetic component to the risk of alcohol dependence
    • a meta-analysis of 9,897 twin pairs from Australian and US studies found the heritability of alcohol dependence to be in excess of 50%
  • psychological factors
    • psychiatric comorbidity
    • particularly depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), psychosis and drug misuse
  • stress, adverse life events and abuse
  • sex:
    • men are twice as likely to be problem drinkers
  • occupation:
    • publicans and brewers have an increased access to drink and are at a higher risk
    • heavy drinking is seen as the norm in some jobs e.g. sailors
  • homelessness:
    • a third of homeless people have a drink problem
  • race:
    • British Afro-Caribbeans and Asians have a lower rate of drink problems
    • 20% of Chinese and Japanese cannot drink alcohol because of an inherited deficiency of acetaldehyde dehydrogenase (1)

Reference:


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