Addiction as Maladaptive Choice of Drugs over Non-Drug Rewards

描述(由申请者提供)：上瘾是一种破坏性的疾病，影响着2000多万美国人。这种障碍最近被概念化为一种不适应选择药物奖励而不是非药物替代奖励的模式。导致个人做出如此看似糟糕的选择的因素并没有得到很好的理解。这里提出的这项研究的目标是填补这一关键的知识缺口，努力潜在地帮助解决成瘾问题。这将通过将行为经济学领域的最新进展应用于越来越多地使用的基于选择的动物成瘾模型来实现。第一个目的是调查药物(可卡因或海洛因)和非药物奖励(食物或糖精)的基本价值如何决定大鼠在这些奖励之间做出选择的行为。目标2是调查每种类型的奖励在选择之外的可获得性 改变毒品和非毒品奖励的基本价值，并影响它们之间的选择。目标3是确定在总体奖励可获得性的不同背景下，选择机会的频率如何影响选择药物奖励而不是非药物奖励的可能性。在整个拟议的研究中，将特别关注那些被假设为促进过度和不适应的药物奖励选择的情况。回答这些问题将提供关于控制选择使用药物的主要因素的重要信息，即使这种药物使用损害了使用者的长期利益。这些信息将对制定预防和治疗吸毒成瘾的新战略具有重要意义，吸毒成瘾是一个主要的公共卫生问题。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Addiction is a devastating disorder that affects over 20 million Americans. This disorder has recently been conceptualized as a pattern of maladaptive choice of drug rewards over non-drug alternative rewards. The factors that cause individuals to make such seemingly poor choices are not well understood. The goal of the research proposed here is to fill this critical gap in knowledge, in an effort to potentially help solve the problem of addiction. This will be accomplished by applying recent advances in the field of behavioral economics to an increasingly used choice-based animal model of addiction. Aim 1 is to investigate how the essential values of drugs (cocaine or heroin) and non-drug rewards (food or saccharin) determine the behavior of rats choosing between these rewards. Aim 2 is to investigate how the availability of each type of reward outside of the choice situation alters the essential values of drug and non-drug rewards and affects choice between them. Aim 3 is to determine how the frequency of choice opportunity influences the likelihood of the drug reward being chosen over the non-drug reward in different contexts of overall reward availability. Special focus will be placed throughout the proposed research on those situations hypothesized to promote excessive and maladaptive choice of the drug reward. Answering these questions will provide important information about the major factors that control the choice to use drugs, even when such drug use is detrimental to the long- term interests of the user. This information will be significant for the development of new strategies designed to prevent and treat drug addiction, a major public health problem.