Disentangling Differing Relationships Between Internalizing Disorders and Alcohol Use

Brasher, Maizy S.

Graduate Thesis Or Dissertation

Disentangling Differing Relationships Between Internalizing Disorders and Alcohol Use Public Deposited

Analytics

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Citeable URL: https://scholar.colorado.edu/concern/graduate_thesis_or_dissertations/kd17cv54v

Abstract

Both internalizing disorders and alcohol use have dramatic, wide-spread implications for global health. Previous work has established common phenotypic comorbidity among these disorders, as well as shared genetic variation underlying internalizing and alcohol use. We used genomic structural equation modeling to investigate the shared genetics of internalizing, externalizing, and alcohol use traits, as well as to explore whether specific domains of internalizing symptoms mediate the contrasting relationships with problematic alcohol use compared to alcohol consumption. We also examined patterns of genetic correlations between similar traits within additional Finnish and East Asian ancestry groups. When the shared genetic influence of externalizing psychopathology was accounted for, the effect of internalizing on alcohol use was reduced, suggesting the important role of common genetic factors underlying multiple psychiatric disorders and the genetic influences on comorbidity of internalizing and alcohol use traits. Individual internalizing domains had contrasting effects on frequency of alcohol consumption, which demonstrate the complex system of pleiotropy that exists, even within similar disorders, and can be missed when evaluating only relationships among formal diagnoses. Future work must consider both the broad effects of shared psychopathology and the fine-scale effects of heterogeneity within disorders in order to more fully understand the biology underlying complex traits.

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