Alcohol use is a severe and worldwide problem; statistics from the World Health Organization (WHO) showed that, as of February 2011, the harmful use of alcohol results in 2.5 million deaths each year. Alcohol is the world's 3rd largest risk factor for disease, including cardiovascular disease, liver cirrhosis, and various cancers. Furthermore, 320,000 young people between the ages of 15 and 29 die from alcohol-related causes annually (Stevens et al. 2009). Many current behavior genetic approaches seek to identify some of the underlying genetic factors that confer higher risk to genetically influenced disorders; here, we examine genetic variation in gamma aminobutyric acid receptor alpha 2 (GABRA2) for association with phenotypes relating to alcohol use disorders using two independently ascertained samples.
