RESEARCH ARTICLE Deficient Event-Related Theta Oscillations in Individuals at Risk for Alcoholism: A Study of Reward Processing and Impulsivity Features

Background Individuals at high risk to develop alcoholism often manifest neurocognitive deficits as well as increased impulsivity. Event-related oscillations (EROs) have been used to effectively measure brain (dys)function during cognitive tasks in individuals with alcoholism and related disorders and in those at risk to develop these disorders. The current study exam-ines ERO theta power during reward processing as well as impulsivity in adolescent and young adult subjects at high risk for alcoholism. Methods EROs were recorded during a monetary gambling task (MGT) in 12–25 years old partici-pants (N = 1821; males = 48%) from high risk alcoholic families (HR, N = 1534) and compar-ison low risk community families (LR, N = 287) from the Collaborative Study on the Genetics of Alcoholism (COGA). Impulsivity scores and prevalence of externalizing diagnoses were also compared between LR and HR groups. Result