New in\u00a0JNeurosci,\u00a0Mary Schneider\u00a0and\u00a0Alexander Converse,\u00a0from\u00a0the University of Wisconsin-Madison, led an interdisciplinary study to\u00a0explore\u00a0how\u00a0prenatal alcohol and stress exposure\u00a0affect\u00a0rhesus monkey offspring\u00a0in adulthood.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Pregnant rhesus monkeys\u00a0either\u00a0drank\u00a0moderate amounts of alcohol,\u00a0experienced\u00a0mild stress, or both.\u00a0The researchers\u00a0later\u00a0assessed\u00a0changes to the brain’s dopamine system\u00a0and alcohol drinking\u00a0in\u00a0adult\u00a0offspring.\u00a0Prenatal stress\u00a0and alcohol\u00a0influenced\u00a0the dopamine system\u00a0of offspring,\u00a0and\u00a0the\u00a0prenatal alcohol exposure\u00a0group\u00a0drank alcohol faster\u00a0in adulthood.\u00a0Measures of the dopamine system in\u00a0offspring\u00a0before they drank predicted their drinking behavior, supporting\u00a0findings\u00a0from\u00a0human studies of alcohol use disorder. Thus, according to the researchers,\u00a0brain differences may\u00a0exist\u00a0before those with alcohol use\u00a0disorders\u00a0begin drinking.\u00a0<\/p>\n
As offspring\u00a0in this study\u00a0drank alcohol, they experienced\u00a0additional\u00a0changes to the dopamine system\u00a0that\u00a0affected\u00a0how much they drank\u00a0and\u00a0varied on an individual basis.\u00a0The researchers theorize\u00a0that\u00a0this\u00a0could mean\u00a0there\u00a0are\u00a0individualized\u00a0neuroadaptive\u00a0responses to drinking\u00a0that\u00a0promote the\u00a0transition from normal drinking to alcohol use disorder.\u00a0<\/p>\n
According to the researchers,\u00a0their work\u00a0supports the idea that drinking while pregnant\u00a0isn’t\u00a0a good idea\u00a0by linking this behavior to\u00a0maladaptive drinking\u00a0in adult\u00a0offspring. Furthermore, while\u00a0this work did not find a link between\u00a0prenatal stress\u00a0and\u00a0offspring\u00a0drinking behavior,\u00a0the authors suggest that\u00a0it is possible\u00a0that\u00a0prenatal stress\u00a0has implications for other behaviors.\u00a0The researchers\u00a0also\u00a0emphasize that their experimental approach closely models prenatal stress and alcohol exposure in humans,\u00a0making\u00a0this work more relevant clinically.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Source:<\/p>\n
Journal reference:<\/p>\n
Schneider, M.\u00a0& Converse, A., (2026) Prenatal Stress and Prenatal Alcohol Alter the Adult Dopamine System and Alcohol Consumption: Dopamine Drives Drinking Behavior in a Prospective Twenty-Year Longitudinal Experiment with Rhesus Macaques. JNeurosci.\u00a0DOI:\u00a010.1523\/JNEUROSCI.0717-25.2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New in\u00a0JNeurosci,\u00a0Mary Schneider\u00a0and\u00a0Alexander Converse,\u00a0from\u00a0the University of Wisconsin-Madison, led an interdisciplinary study to\u00a0explore\u00a0how\u00a0prenatal alcohol and stress exposure\u00a0affect\u00a0rhesus monkey offspring\u00a0in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":70993,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[78],"tags":[5051,159,34093,18,135,19,17,1281,23295,173],"class_list":["post-316919","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health","tag-alcohol","tag-brain","tag-dopamine","tag-eire","tag-health","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-neuroscience","tag-prenatal","tag-stress"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116002974835638749","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/316919","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=316919"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/316919\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/70993"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=316919"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=316919"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=316919"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}