TY - JOUR PY - 2016// TI - Effects of delaying binge drinking on adolescent brain development: a longitudinal neuroimaging study JO - BMC psychiatry A1 - Bourque, Josiane A1 - Baker, Travis E. A1 - Dagher, Alain A1 - Evans, Alan C. A1 - Garavan, Hugh A1 - Leyton, Marco A1 - Seguin, Jean R. A1 - Pihl, Robert A1 - Conrod, Patricia J. SP - e445 EP - e445 VL - 16 IS - 1 N2 - BACKGROUND: Onset of alcohol use by 14 relative to 21 years of age strongly predicts elevated risk for severe alcohol use problems, with 27% versus 4% of individuals exhibiting alcohol dependence within 10 years of onset. What remains unclear is whether this early alcohol use (i) is a marker for later problems, reflected as a pre-existing developmental predisposition, (ii) causes global neural atrophy or (iii) specifically disturbs neuro-maturational processes implicated in addiction, such as executive functions or reward processing. Since our group has demonstrated that a novel intervention program targeting personality traits associated with adolescent alcohol use can prevent the uptake of drinking and binge drinking by 40 to 60%, a crucial question is whether prevention of early onset alcohol misuse will protect adolescent neurodevelopment and which domains of neurodevelopment can be protected.

METHODS: A subsample of 120 youth at high risk for substance misuse and 30 low-risk youth will be recruited from the Co-Venture trial (Montreal, Canada) to take part in this 5-year follow-up neuroimaging study. The Co-Venture trial is a community-based cluster-randomised trial evaluating the effectiveness of school-based personality-targeted interventions on substance use and cognitive outcomes involving approximately 3800 Grade 7 youths. Half of the 120 high-risk participants will have received the preventative intervention program. Cognitive tasks and structural and functional neuroimaging scans will be conducted at baseline, and at 24- and 48-month follow-up. Two functional paradigms will be used: the Stop-Signal Task to measure motor inhibitory control and a modified version of the Monetary Incentive Delay Task to evaluate reward processing.

DISCUSSION: The expected results should help identify biological vulnerability factors, and quantify the consequences of early alcohol abuse as well as the benefits of early intervention using brain metrics.

Language: en

LA - en SN - 1471-244X UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12888-016-1148-3 ID - ref1 ER -