Noelle Natoli
                1/10/00
               ASC 128 Presentation

               Today I presented the research I did on genetics and alcoholism. The
               reason why I did not get into much detail referring to other drugs is because
               there is not enough valued information. I think the presentation went well,
               but I feel I could have done a lot better. Besides being nervous, I went
               blank about five minutes before I had to get up in front of the class. I
               guess it happens to everybody. It was hard to prepare in such a short amount
               of time, but I feel that I made the best out of it. I'm glad I went first
               because now I'm finished.

               I was really hoping that everyone got some kind of understanding of what
               I was saying. From reading the evaluations, I perceived that most of the
               students did understand what I was talking about, but wanting more
               information relating to the subject.

               I discussed what makes an alcoholic, and part of the reason is the
               metabolism. Pre-alcoholics react to alcohol by wanting more because of a
               genetic difference. They lack the brake that most of us have which is
               slowing down, and knowing when we have had enough. A Prealcohlics brake has
               been replaced by an accelerator, and as we would slow down the prealcoholic
               is picking up speed. Unfortunately scientists don't know the gene that makes
               Prealcohlics, but they continue to research, and explore.

               Another topic I discussed with the class is a brain wave known as P3.
               Doctors have found that a reduced P3 wave is found in alcoholics. P3 remains
               low in alcoholics who have been abstinent for as long as ten years. P3
               amplitudes predate heavy drinking and might be inherited. Scientists have
               tested families and the results showed that in persons with high familial
               alcoholism, P3 was reduced significantly. It is now well established that P3
               is associated with alcoholism risk.

               The two distinct subtypes of alcoholism I talked about were C. Robert
               Cloningers new viewpoints on inheritability of alcoholism. Most people in
               the class wrote on their evaluations that they didn't know that there were
               two types of alcoholics. I'm glad I informed them on something that they
               didn't know. Between the two types of alcoholism, there are many
               differences, or opposites. Type I is mainly women or men, results after the
               age of twenty-five, develops anti-social behavior, drinks steadily, and
               usually this results from environmental behavior. Type II is mostly
               exclusively man, sons of alcoholic fathers, starts at a young age, severe
               behavior occurs such as bottle throwing, door kicking, and it is strongly
               genetic.

               Scientists have studied families of alcoholic and non-alcoholic
               backgrounds. They looked at alcoholic fathers who put their sons up for
               adoption. The biological children of alcoholics had a four times higher risk
               of becoming alcoholics themselves that the children of non-alcoholics, even
               though they were separated from their alcoholic parents since birth. This
               might have come out wrong when I said it in class, but when the experiment
               was reversed- when the children of non-alcoholics were adopted by
               alcoholics-the children had no increased risk for alcoholism, event though
               they were exposed to it in the home.

               In class you had mentioned treatment for alcoholism, and there is
               treatment which I should have mentioned. AA or Alcoholics Anonymous is a
               counseling treatment for alcoholics. Many people do benefit from AA, and in
               fact don't have a problem anymore. Unfortunately I have known cases in which
               AA has failed. Some people resort back to the poison that almost or could
               have killed them. Why people can't brake the addiction, I don't know, but I
               guess there are many addictions people cant overcome. We experience some of
               those addictions in our everyday lives.

               I am glad I got to research this topic because I find it very
               interesting, yet the scientific terminology is not the easiest to understand.
               Even though it is very nerve racking to get up in front of my peers, I like
               the idea of hearing different points from different people in the class.