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Behavioural pharmacology

Breaking the chain of addiction

Nature volume 400, pages 317–319 (1999)Cite this article

Two hallmarks of drug addiction are the compulsive nature of substance use and the high propensity for relapse. Relapse is, in fact, so prevalent that attempts to stop using drugs often lead to repeated cycles of detoxification followed by a return to compulsive substance abuse. How can these cycles be broken? A report by Pilla et al.1 (page 371 of this issue) indicates that, for cocaine at least, conditioned cravings and drug-seeking responses may be reduced using a newly developed partial agonist for the dopamine D3receptor.

The craving for drugs in an addict is driven not only by the pain and discomfort of withdrawal, but also by the expected rewarding effect of the drug. Craving can even be elicited by stimuli previously associated with taking the drug. Childress, O'Brien and colleagues2,3, for instance, found subjective reports of craving in abstinent opiate or cocaine addicts shown films of the paraphernalia associated with taking drugs. This conditioned craving effect remained strong after years of abstinence, and could be elicited by drug-associated stimuli as apparently innocuous as money. These results illustrate the powerful hold that learned associations have over addicts.

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Figure 1: Model of how a partial dopamine agonist (BP 897) may reduce cocaine craving.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychiatry, University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, VAMC (151), University and Woodland Avenues, Philadelphia, 19104, Pennsylvania, USA

    Gary Aston-Jones & Jonathan Druhan

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  1. Gary Aston-Jones
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  2. Jonathan Druhan
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Aston-Jones, G., Druhan, J. Breaking the chain of addiction. Nature 400, 317–319 (1999). https://doi.org/10.1038/22432

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