Repeated exposure to psychomotor stimulants produces a striking behavioral syndrome involving repetitive, stereotypic behaviors that occur if an additional exposure to the stimulant is experienced. The same stimulant exposure produces specific alterations in gene expression patterns in the striatum. To identify the dopamine receptor subtypes required for the parallel expression of these acquire...

Chapters 2, 3 and 4 may help to explain why Lewis rats are the only rat strain so far tested to show a rewarding effect of ∆ 9-THC on MFB self-stimulation (Lepore et al., 1996a). The present chapter provides research on a behavioural assay of the addictive potential of cannabis. Furthermore, it provides an animal model of the "gateway hypothesis " , that is, the notion that prior exposure to ca...

Individuals with schizophrenia are at very high risk for drug abuse and addiction. Patients with a coexisting drug problem fare worse than patients who do not use drugs, and are also more difficult to treat. Current hypotheses cannot adequately account for why patients with schizophrenia so often have a co-morbid drug problem. I present here a complementary hypothesis based on evidence showing ...

The spontaneous behavior of humans can be altered dramatically by repeated exposure to psychomotor stimulants. We have developed a primate model for analyzing the neurobiology underlying such drug-induced behavioral changes. We performed ethogram-based behavioral assays on squirrel monkeys given single or multiple cocaine treatments, and in the same monkeys made anatomical plots of striatal neu...