Consumption of intoxicating beverages by rats and mice exhibiting high and low preferences for ethanol

Lines of rats selectively bred for alcohol consumption or avoidance (AA and ANA, ALKO, Finland) as well as inbred strains of mice (C57BL/6J and DBA/2J) and common female Wistar rats (Charles River) exhibiting high and low preferences for ethanol were tested under free-choice conditions for their consumption of solutions of ethanol (5, 10, or 15 g/100 ml tap water), sodium pentobarbital (0.19, 0.038, 0.076 g/100 ml tap water), and different beverages containing ethanol in the range of 8.1--9.6% (red and white wine, Scotch, ethanol in Hawaiian Punch). The Wistar rats and the mice classified as alcohol-preferring also tended to consume more of the pentobarbital solution than did alcohol-avoiding animals. Alcohol-nonaccepting (ANA) rats, however, consumed considerably more of all three pentobarbital solutions than did the alcohol-accepting (AA) rats. The intake of pentobarbital by the ANA rats and C57/BL/6J mice was in the range of 25--40 mg/kg/day, quantities that might be expected to produce pharmacological effects discriminable by those animals. The intake of ethanol by ANA rats was markedly elevated when the ethanol was contained in white wine or in punch.