What causes problem drinking? Your mother, it seems, at least in part. Just a few nights of heavy drinking by expecting moms increases the unborn child's chance of developing a drinking problem later in life by up to three times. The dangers of prenatal exposure to alcohol persist even when a family history of alcoholism and other related risks are taken into account.
John Baer and Ann Streissguth, of the University of Washington, have studied drinking during pregnancy over the decades and found that 80 percent of the women in the study drank while pregnant, and 31 percent admitted to drinking heavily—defined as five or more beers in one sitting. Their children, now adults, were interviewed to determine the prevalence of alcohol abuse.
Results show that 14 percent of adults who were exposed before birth to heavy drinking experienced alcohol abuse at age 21, compared to 4.5 percent of those not exposed. And contrary to other study findings, no connection was discovered between exposure to prenatal smoking and adolescent nicotine addiction.
