Citation

Grant JD, Agrawal A, Werner KB, McCutcheon VV, Nelson EC, Madden PAF, Bucholz KK, Heath AC, Sartor CE. Drug Alcohol Depend. 2017; 179: 146-152.

Affiliation

Department of Psychiatry, Washington University School of Medicine, 660 S. Euclid Avenue, Campus Box 8134, Saint Louis, MO 63110, USA; Department of Psychiatry, Yale University School of Medicine, 389 Whitney Avenue, New Haven, CT 06511, USA.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2017, Elsevier Publishing)

DOI

10.1016/j.drugalcdep.2017.06.038

PMID

28779616

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Childhood maltreatment is a known risk factor for cannabis initiation and problem use, but the extent to which this association is attributable to shared familial influences is unknown. We estimate the magnitude of associations between childhood maltreatment, timing of cannabis initiation, and cannabis-related problems, in European-American (EA) and African-American (AA) women, and parse the relative influence of additive genetic (A), shared environmental (C), and individual-specific environmental (E) factors on these constructs and their covariation.

METHODS: Data were from diagnostic telephone interviews conducted with 3786 participants (14.6% AA) in a population-based study of female twins. Logistic regression analyses and twin modeling were used to test for associations, and estimate the relative contributions of genetic and environmental influences to childhood maltreatment and cannabis outcomes and their covariation.

RESULTS: Maltreatment was significantly associated with increased likelihood of cannabis initiation before age 15 among EAs (OR=6.33) and AAs (OR=3.93), but with increased likelihood of later initiation among EAs only (OR=1.68). Maltreatment was associated with cannabis problems among both groups (EA OR=2.32; AA OR=2.03). Among EA women, the covariation between maltreatment and cannabis outcomes was primarily attributable to familial environment (rC=0.67-0.70); among AAs, only individual-specific environment contributed (rE=0.37-0.40).

CONCLUSION: Childhood maltreatment is a major contributor to early initiation of cannabis as well as progression to cannabis problems in both AA and EA women. Distinctions by race/ethnicity are not in the relative contribution of genetic factors, but rather in the type of environmental influences that contribute to stages of cannabis involvement.

Copyright © 2017. Published by Elsevier B.V.

Language: en

Keywords

Cannabis initiation; Cannabis problems; Childhood maltreatment; Heritability; Race/ethnicity; Twins