To identify markers of future alcoholism, researchers have often used a prospective, high-risk research paradigm by following sons of alcoholic fathers (Goodwin et al., 1999, Goodwin et al., 1994; Schuckit, 1991) or offspring-of-twins designs. The latter studies focus on genetic and environmental factors underlying relationships between parental and offspring risk of alcoholism (Jacob et al., 2003; Slutske et al., 2008) or associations between parental alcoholism and offspring behavioural disorders (Haber et al., 2005; Knopik et al, 2009). However, to examine risk factors for alcoholism in the general population, it is necessary to employ a broader population-based approach. In recent years, data on risk factors for substance abuse have emerged from large birth cohort studies such as the Mater University Study of Pregnancy (MUSP) (Alati et al., 2005), the Copenhagen Metropolit Study (Osler et al., 2006) and the Copenhagen Perinatal Cohort (Brennan et al., 2002). Such studies are well suited to estimate offspring risk of alcoholism conditional on parental history of alcoholism.
