TxN have more severe alcohol use histories and a greater family history density of alcohol problems (Fein and Landman 2005), more impaired decision making (Fein, Klein et al. 2004; Fein, Landman et al. 2006; Fein, McGillivray et al. 2006), more psychiatric (especially externalizing) diagnoses and symptoms, and more abnormal psychological measures of the substrates for these psychiatric problems (Di Sclafani, Finn et al. 2008). In the current data, psychopathic deviance scores and socialization scores were more deviant in LTAA than TxN, but were comparably correlated with sensation seeking scores in both groups. In addition, over three quarters of LTAA were members of AA, a 12-step program that strongly and repetitively espouses more normative behavior with regard to sensation seeking, consistent with normalization of elevated sensation seeking as an important aspect of 12-step recovery. Based on these reasons, we expected LTAA to have elevated sensation seeking compared to both NAC and TxN, and see the lack of this finding as suggesting a normalization of sensation seeking (from such elevated values) in LTAA. Moreover, since we required a minimum of 6 months abstinence for LTAA, and sensation seeking scores were not correlated with duration of abstinence in LTAA, we hypothesize that the
