correlations, indicating shared genetic influences. Suggestive evidence of linkage for N4 amplitudes has been noted in several chromosomal regions (Almasy et al., 1999; Almasy et al., 2001). Studies have shown decreased P3 amplitude in alcohol dependent individuals (Porjesz and Begleiter, 1985), that persisted after long abstinence (Porjesz and Begleiter, 1987), and in young alcohol-naïve children of alcoholic probands (Begleiter et al., 1984; Polich et al., 1994). P3 amplitude is thought to be related to stimulus significance and the reduced amplitude in alcoholics and their offspring implies difficulty in discriminating stimulus relevance (Porjesz and Begleiter, 1996). In a semantic priming study, impairment for associated targets during alcohol intake in subjects with positive parental history compared to negative parental history for alcoholism was observed (Sayette et al., 2001). Similarly, adult male alcoholics (Porjesz et al., 2002) and HR male subjects in the current study, showed lack of priming effect as well as lack of discrimination between the primed and unprimed stimuli. Based on these results, it appears that the inability to discriminate between primed and unprimed words and lack of priming effect seen in alcoholics is already present in high risk offspring of alcoholics prior to alcohol dependence. The results suggest that
