Date of Award

5-2026

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts in Psychological Science

Department

Psychology

First Reader/Committee Chair

Leslie Amodeo

Abstract

Adolescent alcohol consumption has been a growing concern in developing alcohol use disorders and alcohol-related sleep issues/disorders later in adulthood. The orexin system is involved in the homeostasis of sleep/wake cycles, feeding, drinking, and motivation. Alcohol consumption increases orexin neuron activity leading to high motivation and drug-seeking behavior for alcohol use and negatively impacting sleep. Ideally, inhibiting the orexin system could be a potential target for reducing consumption and motivation for alcohol use in adulthood as well as improving alcohol-related sleep issues. Previous work has shown that SB-334867, an orexin- 1 receptor (OX1R) antagonist, reduces ethanol-related behavior, but there is a lack of research regarding sleep. For this study, we intend to investigate the effects of SB-334867 on rest-wake activity concurrent with adult drinking behaviors after adolescent alcohol consumption. Adolescent female and male Wister rats will receive 24-hour access to a 2-bottle choice paradigm of 20% ethanol and water for 5 weeks. Rest/ wake activity measures will be assessed at the end of adolescence, young adulthood, and adulthood. At the start of adulthood, rats will be assessed for motivation vs consumption behavior using fixed-ratio and progressive ratio tasks for 20% ethanol. Finally, we will investigate whether the progressive ratio for the ethanol task is altered by SB-334867 (30 or 60 mg/kg) and concurrently rest-wake activity is improved after administration. We hypothesize that high adolescent consumers will have more disrupted rest-wake patterns and continue to persist into adulthood. We expect high ethanol-consuming adolescent rats to continue as high consumers and display high motivation and consumptive behaviors on fixed and progressive ratios. Lastly, we expect that SB-334867 will dose-dependently reduce consumption and motivation for alcohol and improve rest-wake activity, especially in high consumers compared to low consumers.

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