This letter is a report on a comparison between two methods of assessment of dopamine function in a group of abstinent alcoholics, one a neuroendocrine challenge test using a dopaminergic probe, and the other a measurement of platelet monoamine oxidase (MAO) enzyme activity. This enzyme is on the dopamine degradation pathway and has been reported as having diminished activity in alcoholics (Pan...

Chronic alcoholism has profound effects on the brain, including volume reductions in regions critical for eyeblink classical conditioning (EBCC). The current study challenged abstinent alcoholics using delay (n = 20) and trace (n = 17) discrimination/reversal EBCC. Comparisons revealed a significant difference between delay and trace conditioning performance during reversal (t (35) = 2.08, p < ...

Previous studies, based on amplitude and latency measurements of auditory event-related brain potentials, yielded inconclusive results about the status of mismatch negativity (MMN) in chronic alcoholics. The present study explores scalp current density (SCD) dynamics during MMN latency range in alcoholics, and correlates electrical SCD results with clinical data of the patients. SCD was compute...

A methodological advance in studying a given abnormal behavior would be the production, under controlled observation, of the deviant behavior itself. Work with alcoholics who are inebriated provides such an opportunity for study. The literature on experimental intoxication of subjects (Ss) is rather sparse (Gantt, 19S7; Hartocollis, 1962; Kawi, 1961; Newman, 1935; Takala, Pikkanen, & Markkanen,...

Proponents of the disease concept of alcoholism have argued that its dissemination among the general public will promote humanitarian attitudes toward alcoholics. This claim was subjected to empirical scrutiny. A quota sample of 200 members of the general public completed a questionnaire designed to measure beliefs about alcoholism and attitudes toward alcoholics. As predicted, the majority of ...

I propose a study to examine children of alcoholics with anxiety and see which treatment method is most effective. Children of alcoholics (COAs) are more likely to suffer anxiety. Some research completed indicates that there can be an environmental or genetic factors involved. Therapy for children of alcoholics is severely under researched. I am proposing to examine four different types of ther...

This article represents a symposium of the 2004 ISBRA Congress held in Mannheim. The presentations were: Review of the neuropathological and neurochemical changes seen in alcohol-related ‘brain shrinkage’ by Clive Harper; In Vivo Detection of Macrostructural and Microstructural Markers of Brain Integrity in Human Alcoholism and a Rodent Model of Alcoholism by Adolf Pfefferbaum, Elfar Adalsteins...

An analysis of the brain weights of 168 alcoholics showed that the mean brain weight of male alcoholics was less (p less than 0.001) than that of a normal population. Two subgroups of alcoholics were identified. Firstly, those with nutritional brain damage (Wernicke's encephalopathy, caused by vitamin B1 deficiency) and, secondly, those with brains which appeared "normal" macroscopically and mi...

letter is a report of a re-evaluation of the results obtained in an earlier study of ours (Balldin et al., 1994) of platelet monoamine oxidase (MAO)-B activity in alcoholics with reduced dopamine (DA) D 2 receptor function, as assessed by the growth hormone (GH) response to the D 1 /D 2 agonist apomorphine (APO), which was published in this journal. The reason for the re-evaluation of the resul...