A post over on Sciencebase about alcohol, drugs, and genetics prompted a comment from David Brown, which we reproduce in full here:

I’ve studied alcohol issues to some extent as they relate to genetic predisposition and nutritional modulators. It appears that primates share configurations of genetically determined metabolism that affect drinking behavior. Check out this video. Note, it’s not meant to be funny. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pSm7BcQHWXk

Nutritional status also affects drinking behavior.
The following is an excerpt from Nutrition and Your Mind, pages 104-106:

If I were to ask you to name all of the types of fuel the body can utilize, although the reply appears obviously simple, you would probably answer incorrectly. For while carbohydrates, fat, and protein do indeed represent all types of foods we customarily think of, yet biochemically – and socially – something very important must be added: ethyl alcohol.

Although in many ways alcohol does not act as we expect food to act, since it may produce profound pathological reactions, yet from biochemical point of view the utilization of alcohol can be looked at in the very same way that we have examined the breakdown of sugar and fat in the cells of the tissues. And while we lack a full understanding of the effects of alcohol on the system, we do know that there are two related nutritional phases to its metabolism.

First, alcohol increases the blood-sugar level by causing the liver to give up part of its stored sugar (glycogen); hence alcohol stimulates carbohydrate metabolism. Second, alcohol itself is directly broken down – principally in the liver – to produce the energy-rich intermediate acetate (acetyl coenzyme A), which is either oxidized in the citric acid cycle to produce ATP (energy) or converted to other substances such as body fat and cholesterol.

Alcohol is a rich source of acetate, ounce for ounce producing more than sugar or protein, but not quite as much as fat. In addition, however – and this point has an important bearing on its use and abuse – alcohol may be thought of as almost “instant acetate.”

Let us suppose that you’re physically and mentally exhausted – cold, tired, dispirited. Biochemically your cellular acetate is minimal, your blood sugar is low, and you’ve just about run out of ready nutritional reserves. Then someone puts a stiff drink of two ounces of 100-proof whiskey in your hand. As you sip it slowly for a few minutes, life, strength, and hope seem to push out the ache, the cold, and the despair.

If alcohol is new to you, in this moment you have had an almost unforgettable learning experience. You’ve been rewarded at a time and in a way that will be long remembered – consciously or unconsciously. And the next time your energy reserves are gone, and you’re mentally and physically spent, you’ll probably think “whiskey!” You will also have gained personal insight into the experience behind the word, which comes from the Gaelic USQUEBAUGH meaning “water of life.”

Water of life it would indeed be if the whole story of alcohol were to end with its nutritional biochemistry, and it was simply another easily utilizable and wholesome source of energy. But it is not. Every drop of alcohol burned in the tissues creates an nutritional demand for carbohydrates and for many biochemicals that it does not by itself supply, the vitamins and minerals necessary to process it. Consequently, continued, constant, or frequent use of alcohol can lead to depletion of cellular nutritional reserves needed for normal metabolism.

The paradox of alcohol is that while producing acetate and stimulating the breakdown of glucose, which in special circumstances results in apparent immediate physical and mental relief from stress, at the very same time this substance is a dangerous drug, both physically and psychologically.

One might think that since alcohol is metabolized in the normal nutritional pathways of the citric acid cycle, alcoholism is a nutritional disease, one that can be successfully treated by good nutrition. And indeed we have witnessed some dramatic successes using this approach. When psychological dependency has resulted from using alcohol as a substitute for food, then optimum nutrition can help erase the conditions of mental and physical fatigue which provide a stimulus to “think whiskey.”

For literally speaking, if you think you “need a drink” you don’t NEED A DRINK; you need ATP (energy) derived from acetate, through the breakdown of blood sugar, fat , and protein. If one is really well nourished his energy reserves are as high as they can be. This is why truly healthy individuals cannot tolerate alcohol. Their cellular acetate breakdown is near maximum, and any rapid increase such as will result from a drink of whiskey may lead to headache, sweating, nausea, and possibly vomiting. In short, one’s tolerance to alcohol reflects the state of one’s biochemical health. The more one can drink without adverse effect the worse off he is. It is just plain utter biochemical nonsense for people to pride themselves on being able to hold their liquor, for only those in very bad shape can do so.

Unfortunately, the use of alcohol as a nutritional crutch is far from the whole story, however, for there are many reasons why people drink other than nutritional ones. For example, I had a young man tell me he was stopping his optimum diet and vitamin-mineral formula because he was “losing his taste for Scotch.” He preferred the “pleasures of drinking” to the alternative I was offering of increased mental and physical functioning.

However, for those who don’t want to drink, who find alcohol a problem rather than a continuing source of pleasure, their first goal should be to adopt an intensive nutritional program which will build them up to the point where they not only do not feel they “need a drink” – they couldn’t tolerate one without feeling ill if they drank it, amazing as that sounds.

Nutrition alone may not be able to accomplish this for individuals who have vastly overcommitted themselves to a wild and unrealistic round of daily activities. If you are one of these, take a hard look at your current life-style, and reshape it so that energy output is fully compensated for by rest, sleep , and intensive nutrition.

George Watson, PhD, 1972.

Also of interest is the work of Roger J. Williams, PhD, one of the world’s most brilliant biochemists and nutrition experts. Famous for his work with B vitamins, he was the first to identify, isolate, and synthesize pantothenic acid. He also did pioneer work on folic acid and gave it its name. But more importantly, he wrote several (very much ignored) books about alcoholism. They include Nutrition and Alcoholism and Alcoholism: The Nutritional Approach. Also, Chapter 11 of Nutrition against Disease is titled “The Battle Against Alcoholism.” Here are some comments from that chapter:

The fact that some individuals become alcoholics and others – under similar circumstances – do not is inescapable and is of the utmost importance in understanding the disease. When alcoholism strikes, …it only strikes certain individuals, while others remain untouched. Furthermore, it strikes with essentially the same result; the victim becomes a compulsive drinker (pages 166-167).

In traditional medical education, alcoholism is thought of as a primarily mental disease involving a personality disorder or weakness from which an “escape” is sought. While medicine fully recognizes that alcoholics who follow their usual bent are malnourished, this is commonly regarded as a result of their alcoholism. Many physicians have been led to accept as axiomatic the idea that nutrition is of concern only in “deficiency diseases.” That alcoholism might be caused by malnutrition of the brain cells has never been thought worthy of consideration (emphasis mine). It is quite possible, of course, that malnutrition develops as a forerunner of alcoholism, and that it is only when malnutrition of the brain cells becomes severe that true alcoholism appears Page 168).