Our findings suggest that both alcohol consumption behaviour and alcohol dependence status are influenced by genetic variation in ALDH1A1. The results from ANOVA analyses demonstrate that two intronic SNPs (rs610529 and rs348449) and one 3' UTR SNP (rs348479) in ALDH1A1 are nominally (p = 0.01-0.04) associated with alcohol consumption behaviour, as described by the AUDIT (Table 2). While rs348479 and rs610529 are associated with risk of alcohol dependence rather than problem drinking, rs348449 in intron 2 influences harmful alcohol consumption behaviour that leads to alcohol-related problems and alcohol dependence symptoms (as determined by odds ratio and χ2 contingency analyses of allele and genotype frequencies in control and problem drinkers).
