Asthma and allergic rhinitis in adoptees and their adoptive parents.

BACKGROUND: Since the highest risk for the development of atopic disease is in early life, environmental risk factors need to be separated from the genetic component in this high risk period. Adoptees removed at birth and placed in adoptive families present a way to separate environmental and genetic factors at this early susceptible age. METHOD: An opportunity for a pilot study of asthma and allergic rhinitis in adoptive families was presented when a psychiatrist (RC) was planning a behavioral study of young adult adoptees and their adoptive parents. A detailed questionnaire about allergic rhinitis and asthma was added after the psychiatrists' interview. Placement was not influenced by a history of allergy in adoptive or natural parents. The adoptee and at least one adoptive parent completed questionnaires in 367 families. The adoptees had been removed at birth and placed in the adoptive family within 3 months (83% within 1 month). RESULTS: Compared with adoptive families without asthma or allergic rhinitis, an adoptive mother with asthma or rhinitis, when the adoptive father was not affected, increased the risk for asthma in the adoptee (OR = 3.2, P < .0005). Asthma in the adoptive mother alone (OR = 3.2, P < .005) and allergic rhinitis alone (OR = 3.4, P < .005) increased the risk for asthma in the adoptee. Adoptive father asthma or allergic rhinitis showed a trend toward increased asthma in the adoptee (OR = 1.9, P < .1). CONCLUSION: This should be considered a pilot or feasibility study since subjects could not be examined or tested. Finding a risk for atopic respiratory disease or asthma associated with adoption by parents with asthma or allergic rhinitis suggests that further well planned adoptee studies should be made.

Distinct contributions of conduct and oppositional defiant symptoms to adult antisocial behavior: evidence from an adoption study.

BACKGROUND: We conducted an exploratory multivariate analysis of juvenile behavior symptoms in an adoption data set. One goal was to see if a few DSM-interpretable symptom dimensions economically captured information within the data. A second goal was to study the relationships between any such dimensions, biological and environmental background, and eventual adult antisocial behavior. METHODS: The data originated from a retrospective adoption study. Probands with a biological background for parental antisocial personality or alcoholism were heavily oversampled. Symptoms were ascertained by proband and adoptive parent interview. We performed, by gender, orthogonal rotated principal component analyses of juvenile behavior disturbance symptoms (females, n = 87; males, n = 88). We used structural equation modeling to examine the relationships hypothesized above. RESULTS: For both genders, an oppositional defiant disorder (ODD) component and at least 1 conduct component emerged. Regardless of the conduct component scores, the ODD components were significant predictors of adult antisocial behavior. For males, the ODD component was predicted by an antisocial biological background, but not by scores on the Adverse Adoptive Environment Scale. The conduct components were predicted by adoptive environment alone. For females, biological background or biological-environmental interactions predicted each of the components. CONCLUSIONS: There has been little previous distinction between conduct disorder and ODD in studies of genetic and environmental influences on juvenile behavior. The study suggests that adolescent ODD symptoms may be a distinct antecedent of adult antisocial personality. In males, adolescent ODD symptoms may represent early expression of genetic sociopathic personality traits.

Effect of fetal alcohol exposure on adult symptoms of nicotine, alcohol, and drug dependence.

OBJECTIVES: The objective of this study is to examine the effect of fetal alcohol exposure on later substance dependence using an adoption study method. METHODS: One hundred ninety-seven adoptees were interviewed for substance abuse disorders, including nicotine, alcohol, and drug dependence. Twenty-one adoptees had mothers who drank during pregnancy. Adoptees with fetal alcohol exposure were compared with those without fetal alcohol exposure for symptoms of adult nicotine, alcohol, and drug dependence. RESULTS: Adoptee symptom counts for alcohol, drug, and nicotine dependence were higher for those exposed to alcohol in utero. The effect of fetal alcohol exposure remained after controlling for gender, biological parent alcohol dependence diagnosis, birth weight, gestational age and other environmental variables. CONCLUSIONS: Fetal alcohol exposure may produce increased risk for later nicotine, alcohol, and drug dependence. Possible effects of fetal alcohol exposure on development of adult substance use patterns needs attention in genetic studies of substance abuse.

Depression spectrum disease, I: The role of gene-environment interaction.

OBJECTIVE: This study used an adoption study design to separate genetic from environmental factors in the etiology of depression spectrum disease, a type of major depression characterized by families in which male relatives are alcoholic and females are depressed. The genetic etiology hypothesis of depression spectrum disease proposes that an alcoholic genetic diathesis predisposes to depression in females but alcoholism, not depression, in males. METHOD: The study examined 197 adult offspring (95 male and 102 female) of alcoholic biological parents and used logistic regression models to determine the contribution to major depression in male and female adoptees that could be explained by the genetic alcoholic diathesis combined with an environmental factor that was characterized by psychiatrically or behaviorally disturbed adoptive parents. RESULTS: Major depression in females was predicted by an alcoholic diathesis only when combined with the disturbed adoptive parent variable. The same regression model failed to predict depression in males. Other possible environmental confounding factors contributing to an increased chance of depression were found in females: fetal alcohol exposure, age at the time of adoption, and a family with an adopted sibling who had a psychiatric problem. These variables did not diminish the significance of the prediction of depression with the alcohol genetic diathesis and disturbed parent model. CONCLUSIONS: The results show that a genetic factor is present for which alcoholism is at least a marker, and which exerts its effect in women as a gene-environment interaction leading to major depression. This finding suggests that an important etiologic factor in depression spectrum disease is gene-environment interaction.

An adoption study of DSM-IIIR alcohol and drug dependence severity.

OBJECTIVE: The objective of this study was to evaluate the role of genetic factors in alcohol and drug dependence at various levels of DSM-IIIR psychoactive substance dependence severity. METHOD: One-hundred-and-ninety-seven adoptees (95 case adoptees with biological parental alcoholism, drug dependence or antisocial personality disorder and 102 control adoptees) were interviewed for the presence of alcohol abuse or dependence and drug abuse or dependence using the Diagnostic Interview Schedule-DIS IIIR. RESULTS: Adoptees with five or more DSM-IIIR criteria for alcohol dependence demonstrated evidence of a genetic effect using this adoption paradigm (odds ratio = 2.3, 95% C.I. (1.1, 4.9)). Adoptees with one or more DSM-IIIR criteria for drug dependence demonstrated a genetic effect (odds ratio = 2.4, 95% C.I. (1.3, 4.4). CONCLUSIONS: This study suggests genetic factors influence the risk for alcohol and drug dependence at different thresholds of severity as determined by DSM-IIIR symptom severity count.

An adoption study of drug abuse/dependency in females.

In a sample of 102 women who had been adopted at birth, drug abuse/dependency was found by log-linear analyses to have a major pathway of genetic etiology that started with a biologic parent with antisocial personality and led to an adoptee with conduct disorder and then through aggressivity to drug abuse/dependency, as well as from conduct disorder directly to drug abuse. This result was similar to findings from a male sample collected from the same agencies and at the same time, wherein antisocial biologic parents produced aggressive and conduct-disordered off-spring, who in turn became drug abusers/dependents as adults. Results are compatible with family studies demonstrating that female drug abusers stem from deviant families and themselves demonstrate socially deviant behavior early in life. The present study shows that one element of familial factors is genetic, and that, in addition, the family environment directly affects behavior (aggressivity) that leads to drug abuse/dependency.

Genetic-environmental interaction in the genesis of aggressivity and conduct disorders.

BACKGROUND: The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of an adverse adoptive home environment on adoptee conduct disorder, adult antisocial behavior, and two measures of aggressivity, all of which are behaviors that contribute to adult antisocial personality disorder and that also are associated with increased vulnerability to drug abuse and/or dependence. METHODS: The study used an adoption paradigm in which adopted offspring who were separated at birth from biologic parents with documented (by prison and hospital records) antisocial personality disorder and/or alcohol abuse or dependence were followed up as adults. They and their adoptive parents were interviewed in person. These adoptees were compared with controls whose biologic background was negative for documented psychopathologic behavior. Subjects were 95 male and 102 female adoptees and their adoptive parents. RESULTS: Multiple regression analysis was used to measure separately genetic and environmental effects. It showed that (1) a biologic background of antisocial personality disorder predicted increased adolescent aggressivity, conduct disorder, and adult antisocial behaviors, and (2) adverse adoptive home environment (defined as adoptive parents who had marital problems, were divorced, were separated, or had anxiety conditions, depression, substance abuse and/or dependence, or legal problems) independently predicted increased adult antisocial behaviors. Adverse adoptive home environment interacted with biologic background of antisocial personality disorder to result in significantly increased aggressivity and conduct disorder in adoptees in the presence of but not in the absence of a biologic background of antisocial personality disorder. CONCLUSIONS: Environmental effects and genetic-environmental interaction account for significant variability in adoptee aggressivity, conduct disorder, and adult antisocial behavior and have important implications for the prevention and intervention of conduct disorder and associated conditions such as substance abuse and aggressivity.

Adoption study demonstrating two genetic pathways to drug abuse.

BACKGROUND: Studies of adoptees have demonstrated that there are two genetic factors leading to alcohol abuse and/or dependence (abuse/dependence). In addition, environmental factors found in the adoptive family also predict alcohol abuse/dependency independently. One study has found evidence that a similar model of two genetic factors and independent adoptive family factors were involved in drug abuse. Our study was designed to test the hypothesis that genetic factors defined by alcohol abuse/dependency and anti-social personality disorder in biologic parents were etiologic in drug abuse/dependency and that psychiatric problems in adoptive parents were an additional factor associated with drug abuse/dependence. METHODS: A sample of 95 male adoptees, separated at birth from their biologic parents, were followed up as adults to determine their psychiatric diagnosis and their substance use/abuse in a structured interview administered blind to biologic parent diagnoses. A high-risk, case-control design was used wherein half of the adoptees came from biologic parents known to be alcohol abuser/dependent and/or have antisocial personalities (diagnoses from hospital or prison records). These adoptees were matched for age, sex, and adoption agency to a control group of adoptees whose biologic parents were not found in the hospital and prison record search. Adoptive home environment was assessed by structured interviews, including psychiatric assessment of both adoptive parents. RESULTS: Data were analyzed by log-linear modeling, which showed evidence of two genetic pathways to drug abuse/dependency. One pathway went directly from a biologic parent's alcoholism to drug abuse/dependency. The second pathway was more circuitous, and started with anti-social personality disorder in the biologic parent and proceeded through intervening variables of adoptee aggressivity, conduct disorder, antisocial personality disorder, and, eventually, ended in drug abuse/dependency. Environmental factors defined by psychiatric conditions in adoptive families independently predicted increased antisocial personality disorder in the adoptee. Adoptees born of alcohol-abusing mothers showed evidence of fetal alcohol syndrome, but controlling for this did not diminish the evidence for the direct genetic effect between an alcohol-abusing biologic parent and drug abuse/dependency in offspring. CONCLUSIONS: This study confirms the model of two independent genetic factors involved in drug abuse/dependence and previous findings that disturbed adoptive parents are associated with adoptee drug abuse/dependency.

Interpersonal variables in the prediction of alcoholism among adoptees: evidence for gene-environment interactions.

The contributions of genetic and both positive and negative environmental factors were tested in the prediction of alcohol abuse/dependence among 300 adult adoptees. No direct effects for either genetic or environmental factors were significant in the prediction of adoptee alcohol abuse/dependence. However, among women, early-life family conflict and psychopathology in the adoptive family interacted with a biological background of alcoholism. Among women with at least one alcoholic biological parent, conflict or psychopathology in the adoptive family increased the probability of alcohol abuse and/or dependence. Among men, no significant interactions were found between a biological background of alcoholism and environmental variables. Results suggest a pattern of gene-environment interaction among women.

Evidence of heterogeneity of genetic effect in Iowa adoption studies.

This paper describes male adoption studies at the University of Iowa using private and public adoption agencies within the state of Iowa from 1974 to the present time. This research involves four large studies, the first two of which demonstrated significant genetic as well as environmental effects in the etiology of alcoholism as well as significant correlations between adoptee conditions of antisocial personality and alcohol abuse. Findings in the first two studies were similar. However, the third study, using a sample from Catholic-sponsored adoption agencies across the state, failed to show a genetic effect. The final and fourth study was designed in part to look for heterogeneity in the manifestation of a genetic factor from one sample to another in the Iowa studies. This was done by sampling from two agencies, one of which had shown a genetic effect and the other that had not. In this fourth study, the agency that had not shown a genetic effect in the previous study also failed to show an effect, but the agency that had shown a significant genetic effect in the past did demonstrate a significant genetic effect. There were two remaining agencies in the fourth study for which no comparison with past samples could be made. One of these agencies showed a marginally significant genetic effect and the other showed no effect. Statistical analysis of this last study suggested that observed variability in the odds ratio from sample to sample was due to differences in manifestation of the genetic effect.

Genetic and environmental factors in adoptee antisocial personality.

In a sample of 286 adult male adoptees 44 met criteria for antisocial personality (ASP). Two types of biologic parent background were associated with increased incidence of ASP in offspring: those with alcohol problem and those with a criminal conviction or adjudged delinquency. ASP adoptees were also significantly more likely to be alcoholic. Log linear modeling showed that alcohol problems in a biologic parent predicted increased alcohol abuse in the adoptee and that criminality/delinquency in a biologic parent predicted adult adoptee ASP. In the log-linear model two environmental factors significantly increased adoptee ASP: (1) placement in an adoptive home where there was an alcohol problem or antisocial behavior; and (2) placement in a lower socioeconomic home when the adoptee came from a background of criminality/delinquency in a biologic parent. When the adoptee did not have this biologic background socioeconomic level appeared to have little effect on ASP incidence. The results suggest the importance of genetic-environmental interaction in the genesis of adult ASP disorder.

Frequency of DSM-III personality disorders in patients with panic disorder: comparison with psychiatric and normal control subjects.

Three clinical populations--panic disorder (n = 88), randomly selected outpatients (n = 82), and normal control subjects (n = 40)--were compared on three standardized DSM-III personality disorder instruments, the Structured Interview for DSM-III Personality Disorders (SIDP), the Millon Clinical Multiaxial Inventory (MCMI), and the Personality Diagnostic Questionnaire (PDQ). Significant differences were consistently found in presence of "any" personality disorder and DSM-III Cluster C (there were always more disorders in the outpatients). Logistic regression analysis revealed the important determinants predicting personality disorders, and therefore of differences between groups, were state depression, age, lifetime history of alcohol abuse, and presence of panic disorder.

Specific familial transmission in substance abuse.

In contrast to studies on alcoholism, there is little documentation on familial transmission of drug abuse. This study was designed to determine whether specific familial transmission of substance abuse occurs: a greater incidence of drug abuse in probands with a family history of drug abuse than in those with a family history of alcoholism. Probands were 305 consecutively admitted patients to an inpatient chemical dependency treatment center, whose substance abuse/dependence diagnoses were based on DSM-III criteria and a structured interview. Family history data were obtained from each proband. Log linear analysis investigated the association between family and proband substance abuse. As abuse of nonalcoholic substances was significantly greater in probands with family histories of drug abuse, specific familial transmission is suggested.

Comparison of DSM-III personality disorders in recovered depressed and panic disorder patients.

A previous report using non-DSM-III measures indicated that recovered panic disorder and recovered major depressive patients have similar personality traits. To replicate this finding on DSM-III measures, 57 recovered panic, 19 recovered depressed, and 40 normal subjects were compared on standardized DSM-III personality measures. Virtually no differences were found between recovered major depression and recovered panic disorder patients. However, these two groups did differ from normal subjects in that they were more socially insecure and dependent.

Suicide attempts in antisocial alcoholics.

The dual diagnoses of alcoholism and antisocial personality are frequently associated with suicide attempts. A group of 94 alcoholics with antisocial personality were divided on the basis of a previous suicide attempt. A variety of symptoms, including depression, alcohol and drug abuse, conduct disorder, and violence were found more frequently in the suicide attempter group as reported on the structured interview. These emotional problems were additionally found to have an earlier onset. The results were consistent with the concept of secondary sociopathy and indicated that higher psychopathology may be associated with suicide behavior.

Genetic contributions to human fatness: an adoption study.

A strong relationship was found between the degree of fatness of biologic mothers and that of their adult offspring who had been separated from their mothers at birth and adopted during the first year of life. This relationship persisted even after age, height, and possible confounding environmental factors were controlled. There was little evidence for either selective placement on the basis of parental fatness or gene-environment interaction. There was no relationship between the degree of fatness of adoptive parents and that of the adoptees. Two indexes of environmental influence--rural upbringing and disturbance in the adoptive home--predicted fatness among adoptees.

Behavioral complications of alcoholism.

Behavioral complications of alcoholism are frequently found in young alcoholics before medical complications develop. The antisocial alcoholic is at high risk of behavioral complications, including aggressive, violent behavior and accidental injury. Because of the markedly increased risk of trauma in alcoholism, the family physician should investigate the possible role of alcohol or other drug use in any patient with an injury.

Dependent personality disorder associated with phobic avoidance in patients with panic disorder.

Eighty-eight panic disorder patients were divided into three groups according to the extent of their phobic avoidance (none, limited, or extensive). These groups were compared on three personality disorder instruments: the Structured Interview for DSM-III Personality Disorders, the Personality Diagnostic Questionnaire, and the Millon Clinical Multiaxial Inventory. Phobic patients were found to have significantly more dependent personality disorder and DSM-III third-cluster personality disorders than nonphobic patients. A subgroup of patients with social phobic symptoms was found to resemble the rest of the phobic group in terms of personality.

Genetic and environmental factors in alcohol abuse and antisocial personality.

Previous analyses of adoptees from Lutheran Social Services of Iowa developed a multifactorial model of adoptee alcohol abuse that related abuse to three factors: biologic background of alcohol-related problems, biologic background of antisocial problems and exposure to an adoptive family where family members had alcohol-related problems. The present study examines an independently collected sample of adoptees from a different agency--the Iowa Children's and Family Services, and confirms the multifactorial model previously found in the Lutheran Social Service data. The model shows a specificity of type of inheritance and type of environmental influence: biologic family alcohol-related problems predict increased alcohol abuse in adoptee, biologic family antisocial behaviors predict increased antisocial personality diagnoses in adoptee, and environmental factors of alcohol-related problems in the adoptive family predict increased adoptee alcohol abuse.

An adoption study of genetic and environmental factors in drug abuse.

In a sample of 242 male and 201 female adoptees who had been separated at birth from biologic parents, adult adoptee diagnoses of alcohol abuse, drug abuse and antisocial personality were correlated with biologic and environmental factors. Three etiologic relationships with drug abuse were found: drug abuse was highly correlated with antisocial personality, which in turn was predicted from antisocial biologic background; a biologic background of alcohol problems predicted increased drug abuse in adoptees who did not have antisocial personalities; and environmental factors of divorce and psychiatric disturbance in the adoptive family were associated with increased drug abuse.