PSYC 3365 Lecture Notes - Lecture 5: Nucleus Accumbens, Addiction, Cary Grant
Document Summary
Drugs and addiction (class notes ch 5: mechanism of action. People have ingested drugs for thousands of years to alter consciousness for religious or recreation purposes. Our society struggles with the issue of psychoactive drugs. Psychoactive drugs either influence chemical neurotransmission directly or indirectly. Agonist drugs mimic or enhance certain neurotransmitters. Antagonists occupy the receptors without activating them, which shuts them down: addiction. Drug addiction is drug use that accompanies lack of personal control over behavior and cognition. Opioid epidemic: drug overdoses have dramatically increased in the u. s. Nucleus accumbens and dopamine: animals press a lever to deliver mild electrical stimulation. Normal reuptake of dopamine into the presynaptic terminal. Cocaine blocks the reuptake of dopamine, which leaves more dopamine to stimulate the receiving cell. Psychomotor stimulant theory of addiction: addictive drugs change dopamine levels in the nucleus accumbens (or related systems) Volkow: communication between prefrontal cortex and the nucleus accumbens changes as addicts lose control over drug consumption.
