Gender Differences in Neurocognitive Functioning Among Alcohol-Dependent Russian Patients

doi:10.1111/j.1530-0277.2007.00372.x

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Wiley InterScience

Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research

Volume 31 Issue 5, Pages 745 - 754

Published Online: 26 Mar 2007

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Gender Differences in Neurocognitive Functioning Among Alcohol-Dependent Russian Patients

Barbara Flannery ¹ , Diana Fishbein ¹ , Evgeny Krupitsky ² , Doris Langevin ³ , Elena Verbitskaya ² , Cynthia Bland ¹ , Karen Bolla ⁴ , Valentina Egorova ² , Natali Bushara ² , Marina Tsoy ² , and Edwin Zvartau ²

¹ RTI International, Baltimore, Maryland; ² Pavlov Medical University, St. Petersburg, Russian Federation; ³ Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation, Bethesda, Maryland; ⁴ Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Neurology Department, Baltimore, Maryland

Correspondence to Reprint requests: Barbara A. Flannery, PhD, RTI International, 3801 Eastern Avenue, Suite 203, Baltimore, MD 21224; E-mail: bflannery@rti.org

Financial support for this project was provided by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (Grant 1RO1 DA015528-01A1) to Dr. Diana Fishbein (PI) at RTI International.

KEYWORDS

Russia • Alcoholic Subjects • Gender Differences • Neurocognitive Functioning • Neurocognitive Tasks

ABSTRACT

Background: There are a limited number of studies that have examined gender differences in the neurocognitive test performances of alcohol-dependent individuals. Those that have been conducted reported that compared with men, women's visuospatial skills, psychomotor speed, and working memory are more profoundly affected by chronic alcohol abuse despite a shorter duration of drinking and a lesser quantity of alcohol consumed.

Methods: The performances of Russian male and female alcoholic and nonalcoholic control subjects were compared on a series of neurocognitive tasks that assess motor speed, visuoperceptual processing, visuospatial processing, decision making, and cognitive flexibility.

Results: Group and gender differences emerged on specific components of each task administered. Female compared with male alcoholic subjects exhibited poorer performances on tests of visual working memory, spatial planning and problem solving, and cognitive flexibility.

Conclusion: The data support and extend prior research demonstrating a more deleterious impact of alcohol dependence on female alcoholic subjects' cognitive functioning compared with male alcoholic subjects. Several theories are offered to account for gender differences in neurocognitive performance.

Received for publication May 25, 2006; accepted January 4, 2007.

DIGITAL OBJECT IDENTIFIER (DOI)

10.1111/j.1530-0277.2007.00372.x About DOI