Abstract

Earlier studies have suggested that catalase activity may be a predictor of alcohol intake in animals and in humans. The hypothesis that blood catalase may represent a biological marker for human alcohol intake was tested. An initial study was first designed to rule out the possibility that catalase activity is induced as a function of acute alcohol intake. Subjects (N = 80) were presented with either a control solution, or vodka and orange juice (EtOH 0.5 g/kg of bodyweight), and asked to provide four 100 ol blood and four breath alcohol samples (BAC), which were collected at 0.0, 0.5, 2.0, and 24.0 hours. Results showed no significant differences in catalase activity between individuals who had received alcohol, and controls, even when the effects of previous drinking history were covaried out of the analysis. In addition, results showed that, BAC was higher for the alcohol condition compared to that of controls. and for the alcohol condition, females had significantly higher BAC compared to males. This lack of effect of acute alcohol intake on the possible induction of catalase further supported the notion that catalase may be a viable marker of alcohol intake, rather than the converse. In the second study, the relation between catalase activity and alcohol intake was investigated in individuals with a family history of alcoholism (FH+), and without a family history of alcoholism (FH+). Subjects (N = 607) were recruited from three treatment centers as well as from newspaper advertising. They were asked to complete the Michigan Alcoholism Screening Questionnaire (MAST), MacAndrew Scale (MAC), and the Concordia University Alcohol Screening Questionnaire (CASQ). They were also asked to answer questions concerning their family history of alcoholism, and to provide a 100 ol blood sample. Results showed that FH+ individuals had higher mean catalase activity compared to FH- individuals. When individuals with FH+ were compared to those with FH- on the above measures, differences in the pattern of relation between catalase activity and alcohol intake were observed. Although a significant relation between catalase activity and alcohol intake was obtained for both FH- and FH+ individuals, this relation was significantly higher ( p < .001) for individuals with FH+. In order to rule out the possibility that catalase activity in FH+ individuals was a covariate of one or more variables, the data were subjected to multiple regression analysis. Results from the multiple regression analyses suggested that catalase activity in FH+ individuals made the highest contribution to the variance, even after accounting for several additional variables. These results support the contention that catalase activity may be a biological marker of the propensity of FH+ individuals to consume alcohol.