BIO SCI 37 Lecture Notes - Lecture 15: Behavioral Addiction, Substance Dependence, Reuptake
28 May 2016
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Document Summary
There is a certain feeling of loss of control. Impulses and compulsions- a compelling desire to must do something despite the costs. You can become tolerant to that substance or behavior over time- you need more and more of it now. Psychological addiction is more problematic because you crave it. Relapse rates are very high *because of very strong associations. It is easy to get off the drug but staying off the drug is very difficult. It"s important to think about triggers that cause a relapse. Places where it receives dopamine in the brain. Drugs of abuse hijack this mechanism, forcing the individual to seek the drug instead. The pathway is the most primitive system humans have- it is essential for our survival. With excess dopamine- receptors will get cycled back into the synapse- now need few receptors. Next time you do something you like to do, you don"t get the same amount of pleasure from it.
