PSYC62H3 Lecture Notes - Lecture 5: Brain Stimulation Reward, Medial Forebrain Bundle, Nucleus Accumbens
Document Summary
Gains incentive properties and induces approach behaviour by virtue of it producing a pleasurable state. Natural rewards: food, water, sex, nurturing, etc. Artificial rewards: no adaptive value, can strongly control behaviour. Does so by acting on the same structures that natural rewards work on. Olds and milner (1954: discovered that electrical stimulation of certain areas of the brain was rewarding and reinforcing, brain stimulation reward procedure. If an electrode is implanted in the brain reward circuit, they will work to apply stimulation in that brain region. Brain stimulation reward sites include: medial forebrain bundle (mfb, ventral tegmental area (vta, nucleus accumbens, frontal cortex, lateral hypothalamus, substantia nigra, striatum, amygdala, hippocampus, thalamus, cerebellum, locus coeuleus. Effects of a saline injection or cocaine: cocaine produces a dramatic effect. If we substitute morphine, alchohol, etc, there would still be an increase in the dopamine in the na: evidence of its reinforcing effect.
