Test of association between GABRA2 (SNP rs279871) and adolescent conduct/alcohol use disorders utilizing a sample of clinic referred youth with serious substance and conduct problems, controls and available first degree relatives

Recent findings have linked the GABRA2 gene with antisocial personality disorder and alcohol dependence (AD) in adults and conduct disorder (CD), but not AD symptoms, in children and adolescents. We sought to replicate previous findings and test for an association between a single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) in the GABRA2 gene (rs279871) and CD among adolescents.MethodsAdolescent patients (n = 371), 13–18 years old, were recruited from a university substance abuse treatment program. Patient siblings (n = 245), parents of patients (n = 355), adolescent controls (n = 185), siblings of controls (n = 163) and parents of controls (n = 263) were included in these analyses (total sample n = 1582). Case-control (using only Caucasian and Hispanic probands) and family-based association tests were completed to test for association between rs279871 and several a priori CD and AD phenotypes.ResultsFor case-control association tests, rs279871 was significantly associated with CD (p = 0.02) but not AD phenotypes; the result did not survive strict correction for multiple testing. All family-based association tests were non-significant (CD p = 0.48; CD symptom count age corrected within sex p = 0.91; AD p = 0.84; alcohol use disorder p = 0.52).ConclusionsConsistent with previous findings, the results do not support the association between GABRA2 SNP rs279871 and AD in adolescents. Our results also do not support an association between rs279871 and CD; the study limitations are reviewed.