Lecture 12- Psychopharmacology Pt. 2

Question 1

Behavioral (Learned) Tolerance

Answer 1

• Context or environmental specific (context/environment can be enough to promote use)
• Habituation, Pavlovian conditioning, and instrumental conditioning
• Pavlovian/Classical: association of paraphenalia with drug (conditioning) can lead to increased craving when paraphenalia is presente

Question 2

How is Pavolvian (Classical) conditioning related to behavioral tolerance?

Answer 2

• After ppl use a substance in a certain cnotext seeing that context drives brain activation, preparing them for the drug effects
• Watching/seeing paraphenalia w drug (conditioning) causes/increases craving

Question 3

Homeostatic counter-reaction to drug effect w behavioral tolerance

Answer 3

• Our bodies change when presented with a drug we use often, which can be enough to reduce the net effect of the drug (tolerance!)
• ex. caffeine increases heart rate- homeostatic response decreases heart rate

Question 4

Classical conditioning

Answer 4

• Pairing neutral stimulus w unconditioned stimulus (ex. food for dog) turns the neutral stimulus into a conditioned stimulus
• The conditioned stimulus will elicit a conditioned response

Question 5

Antipitation of Reward triggers activation of Dopamine system

Answer 5

• Right after animal gets reward, increase dopamine action potentials/firing (VTA neurons)
• If you train the animal to expect the drug- the stimulus is enough to activate VTA neurons, but when they get the reward the neurons are firing at a slightly higher level
• If no reward given then dopamine stops firing

Question 6

What is operant conditioning?

Answer 6

Action can be changed based on the feedback an organism recieves

Question 7

Positive reinforcement

Answer 7

• Action/behavior that increases likelihood of “good” thing happening again
• ex. studying leads to an A on an exam

Question 8

Negative reinforcement

Answer 8

• Action/behavior that increases likelihood of a “bad” thing not happening again
• ex. turning on AC reduces heat in car

Question 9

Positive punishment

Answer 9

• Adding something unpleasant that decreases the likelihood of a behavior happening again
• Ex. making someone write an essay to explain a bad behavior

Question 10

Negative punishment

Answer 10

• Removing something desirable to decrease likelihood of a behavior happening again
• ex. taking away iPad from kid

Question 11

Positive reinforcement in terms of drug use

Answer 11

• social acceptance
• drug experience
• (positive things that will increase the likelihood of drug use again)

Question 12

negative reinforcement in terms of drug use

Answer 12

• withdrawal
• craving
• (negative feelings that lead to taking the drug again)

Question 13

Positive punishment in terms of drug use

Answer 13

• prison
• (adding the sentence decreases drug use)

Question 14

negative punishment

Answer 14

• money
• family
• health
• prison (taking away freedom)
• removing something that will decrease likelihood of the behavior happening again

Question 15

Self-administration phenomena

Answer 15

Exctinction, reinstatement, drug discrimination, experimental conflict

Question 16

What is extinction?

Answer 16

• Learning that a response doesn’t give you a reward
• Not the same as forgetting

Question 17

What is reinstatement?

Answer 17

• Memory is still present
• the ability of a drug stimulus to reinitiate responding (the return of an extinguished conditioned response after reexposure to the unconditioned stimulus)

Question 18

Drug discrimination

Answer 18

• Can animals distinguish between saline and drug? What drugs do animals prefer?
• You train animal to press level 1 after drug injection (w food as reward). And train animal to press lever 2 after saline injection. Then, test what lever the animal will press when given the drug. Used to distinguish similarities and differences between drugs

Question 19

Experimental conflict

Answer 19

• receiving reinforcement (drug) and punishment (shock)… animal gets shocked when taking drug
• the punishment decreases drug responded, the higher the voltage shock the less the animal takes the drug

Question 20

Conditoned place preference/aversion

Answer 20

• animal receives drug in a specific training chamber and saline in neutral chamber
• the animal will often choose the drug chamber
• If not, this shows that the drug has adversive effects

Question 21

Is tolerance reversible?

Answer 21

• Acute tolerance reverses quickly
• Protracted tolerance requires more time
• Learned/behavioral tolerance is most difficult to reverse

Question 22

Why is learned/behavioral tolerance the most difficult to reverse?

Answer 22

extinction- as soon as the cue arises, craving to do behavior immediately comes back

Question 23

What are the ethical issues associated with testing drugs on humans

Answer 23

• consent
• however, even after years of animal trials 1 person still has to be the guinea pig

Question 24

Why do we need placebo controls?

Answer 24

because people respond to placebos

Question 25

Single blind

Answer 25

subject doesn’t kow the condition but the experimenter does

Question 26

double-blind

Answer 26

neither the subject nor the experimenter knows the conditions

Question 27

What are active placebos?

Answer 27

placebos that cause side-effects that are different from expected effects

Question 28

Which criteria for SUD in the DSM-5 addresses reinforcement and punishment?

Answer 28

• Excessive time spent using the drug
• Continued use despite social/interpersonal problems
• Recurrent use in physically hazardous situations
• Recurrent use despite physical or psychological problem caused by or worsened by use
• Withdrawal