Genes, Prenatal Drug Exposure, and the Postnatal Environment: An Adoption Study

描述(由申请人提供)：拟议的研究旨在利用和扩展现有的前瞻性纵向收养研究，早期生长和发育研究(EGDS：R01HD42608)，以更好地了解遗传因素、产前药物暴露和出生后养育环境如何共同影响幼儿发育，并最终影响个人以后使用药物的风险。我们建议招募200个收养单位(通过领养儿童联系在一起的亲生父母和领养家庭--大约866人)，并利用EGDS研究招募的现有350个收养单位。总共550个枷锁(大约2,382个个体)将提供足够的力量来检查EGDS不是设计用于研究的基因、产前药物暴露和出生后养育环境之间可能的相互作用。采用与EGDS相同的评估策略和测量方法，将对新的200个轭进行纵向跟踪，并从550个轭的全部样本中收集所有参与者的DNA。这一扩大的样本和纵向评估，结合DNA的收集，能够检查下列具体目标：(SA1)了解以后吸毒的遗传风险是如何在幼儿时期的行为中表现出来的；(SA2)估计独立于遗传风险的产前暴露影响；(SA3)独立于遗传风险和产前暴露估计出生后家庭环境影响；(SA4)澄清出生后家庭环境如何调节遗传风险和产前毒品暴露。综合药物滥用向儿童传播的三种可能机制--遗传、产前接触和出生后环境--在宣传公共健康方面具有重要潜力。具体地说，拟议的研究旨在理清遗传、产前和出生后环境因素对儿童早期发展的影响，并审查这些因素之间的相互作用和相互关系。这将有助于通过确定哪些出生后家庭环境因素对减少遗传和产前暴露因素的风险影响最大，指导旨在预防药物依赖或滥用药物父母的子女滥用药物的干预工作。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The proposed research study seeks to use and expand an existing prospective longitudinal adoption study, the Early Growth and Development Study (EGDS: R01HD42608) to better understand how genetic factors, prenatal drug exposure, and postnatal rearing environment operate together to influence toddler development, and ultimately, an individual's risk of later drug use. We propose to recruit 200 yoked adoption units (birth parents and adoptive families linked through the adopted child - approximately 866 individuals) and to capitalize on the existing 350 yokes recruited by the EGDS study. The 550 total yokes (approximately 2,382 individuals) will provide sufficient power to examine possible interactions among genes, prenatal drug exposure and postnatal rearing environment that EGDS was not designed to study. Using the same assessment strategy and measurement as EGDS, the new 200 yokes will be followed longitudinally and DNA will be collected from all participants in the full sample of 550 yokes. This expanded sample and longitudinal assessment, combined with the collection of DNA, enables the examination of the following specific aims: (SA1) Understanding how genetic risk for later drug use is expressed behaviorally in the toddler period; (SA2) Estimating prenatal exposure effects independent of genetic risk; (SA3) Estimating postnatal family environmental effects independent of genetic risk and prenatal exposure; and (SA4) Clarifying how genetic risk and prenatal exposure to drugs are moderated by postnatal family environment. Integrating the three possible mechanisms of the transmission of drug abuse to children - genetic, prenatal exposure and postnatal environment - has important potential for informing public health. Specifically, the proposed study is designed to disentangle the effects of genetic, prenatal and postnatal environmental factors on early child development and to examine interactions and correlations among these factors. This will help guide intervention efforts aimed at the prevention of drug abuse in children of drug-dependent or drug-abusing parents by identifying which postnatal family environmental factors have the most impact on ameliorating risk from genetic and prenatal exposure factors.