The effect of alcohol consumption on the adolescent brain: A systematic review of MRI and fMRI studies of alcohol-using youth.
paper
Cited
Public
- Authors
- Ewing, Sarah W Feldstein; Sakhardande, Ashok; Blakemore, Sarah-Jayne
- Year
- 2014
- Journal
- NeuroImage. Clinical
- PMID
- 26958467
- DOI
- 10.1016/j.nicl.2014.06.011
- PMCID
- PMC4749850
BACKGROUND: A large proportion of adolescents drink alcohol, with many engaging in high-risk patterns of consumption, including binge drinking. Here, we systematically review and synthesize the existing empirical literature on how consuming alcohol affects the developing human brain in alcohol-using (AU) youth. METHODS: For this systematic review, we began by conducting a literature search using the PubMED database to identify all available peer-reviewed magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies of AU adolescents (aged 19 and under). All studies were screened against a strict set of criteria designed to constrain the impact of confounding factors, such as co-occurring psychiatric conditions. RESULTS: Twenty-one studies (10 MRI and 11 fMRI) met the criteria for inclusion. A synthesis of the MRI studies suggested that overall, AU youth showed regional differences in brain structure as compared with non-AU youth, with smaller grey matter volumes and lower white matter integrity in relevant brain areas. In terms of fMRI outcomes, despite equivalent task performance between AU and non-AU youth, AU youth showed a broad pattern of lower task-relevant activation, and greater task-irrelevant activation. In addition, a pattern of gender differences was observed for brain structure and function, with particularly striking effects among AU females. CONCLUSIONS: Alcohol consumption during adolescence was associated with significant differences in structure and function in the developing human brain. However, this is a nascent field, with several limiting factors (including small sample sizes, cross-sectional designs, presence of confounding factors) within many of the reviewed studies, meaning that results should be interpreted in light of the preliminary state of the field. Future longitudinal and large-scale studies are critical to replicate the existing findings, and to provide a more comprehensive and conclusive picture of the effect of alcohol consumption on the developing brain.
Flow chart of publication selection for review, following PRISMA guidelines (Liberati et al., 2009).
LLM interpretation
This is a PRISMA flow chart detailing the publication selection process for a systematic review. Starting from an initial PubMed search of 965 results, 932 articles were excluded based on title and abstract screening, leaving 33 for full manuscript review. After a further 12 articles were excluded for specific criteria, a final total of 21 studies were included, consisting of 10 MRI and 11 fMRI studies.
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| Title | Year | PMID |
|---|---|---|
| Reward processing deficits and impulsivity in high-risk offspring of alcoholics: A study of event-related potentials during a monetary gambling task. | 2015 | 26388585 |
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