# Sex Differences in the Response to Abstinence from Alcohol.

> **NIH NIH R01** · INDIANA UNIVERSITY INDIANAPOLIS · 2020 · $609,842

## Abstract

PROJECT SUMMARY
 Women progress more rapidly than men from social to problematic alcohol drinking. We propose that this
difference may be due in part to a difference in how they respond to abstinence. In laboratory animals, short-
term abstinence increases alcohol consumption, with repeated deprivations leading to disordered drinking. .
We hypothesize that a similar phenomenon exists in humans, and that women are more sensitive to it. We
have recently developed a novel translational paradigm to measure response to abstinence in humans. In this
experiment, we found that after abstinence women, on average, increased, while men decreased their alcohol
seeking. The objectives of this application are to characterize the human post abstinence response in the
lab as well as community and understand its underlying mechanisms in moderate-heavy drinkers. We will
complement our existing dataset with free-access self-administration, use identical alcohol exposures to study
the mechanisms underlying our identified sex differences, and relate our findings to community drinking with
examination of sex differences in how self-reported abstinence intervals influence drinking over a one-year
follow-up. Our long-term goal is to inform alcohol use disorder treatment selection and to design and test
novel interventions using our novel human laboratory measure of post-abstinence response. There is a critical
unfilled need to understand accelerated disease progression among women and our lab-based assessment
coupled to longitudinal follow-up provides the rigorous experimental design to begin to meet that need. This
project will increase our scientific knowledge by advancing the translation between preclinical and clinical
models, eventually informing sex-specific intervention and prevention strategies for problematic drinking and
establishing a model to test those interventions.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10003135
- **Project number:** 5R01AA027236-03
- **Recipient organization:** INDIANA UNIVERSITY INDIANAPOLIS
- **Principal Investigator:** Melissa A Cyders
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2020
- **Award amount:** $609,842
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2018-09-25 → 2023-08-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10003135

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10003135, Sex Differences in the Response to Abstinence from Alcohol. (5R01AA027236-03). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-06-10 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10003135. Licensed CC0.

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