PS268 Midterm: PS268 midterm 1 notes.docx
Document Summary
Four principles of psychoactive drugs: psychoactive = having effects on thoughts, emotions or behaviour, drugs per se, are not good or bad: when drug abuse, drug dependence and risky drug use are talked about, it is the behaviour, the way the drug is being used that is being referred to (ie: cocaine is a good anaesthetic, heroine a good painkiller, every drug has multiple effects although a user might focus on a single aspect of a drug"s effect we do not yet have compounds that alter only one aspect of consciousness virtually every drug that acts in the brain also has effects on the rest of the body, influencing blood pressure, intestinal activity or other functions, both the size and the quality of a drug"s effect depend on the amount the individual has taken an increase in the dose usually causes an increase in the same effects noticed at lower drug levels.
