THE DEVELOPMENT OF ALCOHOL TOLERANCE - ACUTE RECOVERY AS A PREDICTOR

Two experiments examined individual differences in the rate of alcohol tolerance development as a function of acute recovery. Male social drinkers (n = 18) were trained on a complex psychomotor task and subsequently returned for 4 drinking sessions in which they received the same dose (0.84 ml absolute alcohol/kg) and performed the task at intervals while blood alcohol concentrations (BAC) rose and fell (peak BAC = 77.2 mg/dl). A subject''s acute recovery from the impairing effect of alcohol during session 1 was measured by the difference in his performance at the same BAC on the rising and the falling limb of the curve. Rate-of-tolerance development was measured by the rate of change in the subject''s average impairment under the alcohol during sessions 1-4. Acute recovery scores in both experiments significantly predicted the rate at which tolerance developed, accounting for 64% of the variance in these scores (P < 0.0001). Subjects who displayed more acute recovery developed tolerance more quickly. The evidence was considered to imply that the same process may give rise to both acute recovery and tolerance.