Our analysis allowed us to examine the associations between AUD and marital outcomes while accounting for and estimating the familial factors that contribute to marriage and divorce. Consistent with prior findings from population-based EA samples (D’Onofrio et al., 2005; Jerskey et al., 2010), we found significant familial clustering for marriage, with both latent genetic and familial environmental factors contributing to the aggregation of marriage across ancestries in these high-risk families. We also found that familial environment contributed to the aggregation of divorce in families. It is notable that we did not find evidence of genetic factors contributing to the familial aggregation of divorce in either the EA or AA samples, which is different from evidence in samples of EA population cohorts (Jerskey et al., 2010; Salvatore et al., 2018). These findings underscore the importance of accounting for familial influences to understand the associations between AUD and marital outcomes.
