Men who have a hereditary predisposition for a risky consumption of alcohol, get drunk less often, and so often symptoms of alcohol dependence, if you have a steady Partner. This is evident from a comparison of twins, which was carried out by researchers at the Virginia Commonwealth University.

In people with a predisposition for Drinking love relationships to reduce the risk of the alcohol to very to attribute: "We have found that the effects of the genetic risk for alcohol consumption among those who are currently in a relationship, low sind", Dr. Peter Barr, Department of psychology, said at the Institute for human Sciences at Virginia Commonwealth University.

The protective effect was behavior limited to men, which fits with previous research results, according to which marriages and close partnerships-especially when men have a positive impact on the health and the risk. Barr explained: "Relationships often lead to greater social control, which means that the Partner, the behavior of the other monitor. There was someone around that says maybe ,Oh, you drink too much. Maybe you should reduce.‘" Another explanation could be that relations also involve certain expectations. For example, the image to be a good father, husband or friend does not fit together, in order to drink to intoxication.

The study was based on a sample of 1.201 Finnish twins born between 1983 and 1987. They found no differences between men and women in terms of frequency of drinking or symptoms of alcohol dependence. The journal Addiction has published the work.

ZOU