Sweet Taste Preference and Alcohol Dependence

To the Editor: Dr. Kranzler and colleagues asked 122 nonalcoholic subjects to rate a series of sucrose solutions. Comparing subjects with and without a paternal history of alcoholism, they found that subjects in both groups preferred a 0.42-mol sucrose solution. They therefore concluded that their results failed to support the hypothesis that a sweet preference is a marker of alcoholism risk.

I take issue with their logic. Since a paternal history of alcoholism is itself merely an indicator/marker of alcoholism risk, what Dr. Kranzler et al. actually showed is that a sweet preference does not characterize this indicator/marker of alcoholism risk. This is not the same as concluding that a sweet preference is not a marker of alcoholism risk.