Parental histories of alcohol problems were ascertained in a separate module of the AUDADIS following the module evaluating the respondent’s own alcohol history. In assessing family history, interviewers read definitions to respondents that included examples of the diagnostic criteria. Rather than reading the full diagnostic criteria, the definitions included readily observable manifestations of the disorder, since these are the mostly likely to be known to family informants and thus increase the sensitivity of the measure (Andreasen et al. 1977; Zimmerman and Martinez-Pons, 1988; Slutske et al. 1996). Interviewers then asked separately whether respondents’ biological mother or father experienced the condition as defined. From this information, a variable was created representing parental alcohol problems, with the following categories: neither parent, maternal only, paternal only, both parents. The test-retest reliability of AUDADIS family history variables is very good to excellent (Hasin et al., 1997; Grant et al., 2003; Grant et al., 1995).
