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Tag: Brain

  • About Addiction: Your brain, smoking, alcohol and drugs

    Some new, different areas of addiction and some old favorites.  Read on to learn more! Check out this USA Today story about President Obama’s public health fight and goals of reducing drug usage.  He said prevention and education are really what we need. Your Brain and Addiction Science Daily: A genetic variant of a receptor…

  • About Addiction: Alcohol, breast cancer & war veterans

    Check out our weekly links about addiction! Health Day: A new study shows that breast cancer survivors who smoke are at increased risk for a second cancer. The time frame to develop second cancer is fifteen years. Cesar Fax: Drug positives increase consistently with age amongst DC juvenile arrestees. 53% of the juvenile arrestees tested…

  • A perfect little game that teaches all about drug use and addiction

    No matter how much work I put into it, I don’t think I’ll be able to come up with a cuter, more fun, or more educational way to teach you all about what drugs do in the brain than the game on this site (click the link). It’s like you get to do your own,…

  • How I cleaned up my act and dealt with my crystal meth addiction

    I keep referring to the fact that I don’t believe in quick fixes for addiction. My crystal meth addiction Partially, this is due to research I’ve been exposed to that shows changes in the brain that are very long lasting. As I’d mentioned in an earlier post about crystal meth use, it can take as long…

  • Nicotine addiction and genetics – It’s the little things that matter in smoking addiction

    We’ve known for a while that genes play a role in addiction in general and that nicotine is addictive at least in part because it activates receptors for a chemical called Acetylcholine (ACh) that are found all over the brain and body. Nevertheless, finding the specific mechanism for the genetic predisposition has been difficult. Some…

  • Cravings – The all consuming experience of wanting something

    In my studies of addiction, the concept of cravings comes up often. Researchers talk of “wanting” versus “liking” of drugs and of the idea that cravings are a programmed response to environmental signals that have been connected to drug use through experience. What are cravings? I agree with these descriptions and the idea that cravings…

  • Addiction is a disorder of control, not choice – A response to Heyman’s book

    I was working on the first chapter of my book today and the issue of choice plays a prominent part in it. I’m a little pissed at Dr. Heyman, whose name sounds like something a stoner might say, about his book, “Addiction – A disorder of choice”. The thing is that at its most basic,…

  • The misunderstanding of addiction neuroscience

    I just read a comment on another blogger’s post about the neuroscience of sex addiction. The commenter just couldn’t understand why an addict’s behavior could be rationalized by neuroscience when so many other people have little problem, even when exposed to sex, drugs, or whatnot. It seems simple to me, but I’ve been doing research…

  • Addiction-brain effects: Sex addiction, neurotransmitters, and being love addicted

    ***A disclaimer: Sex addiction is a relatively new concept in science. I haven’t been able to find much research on the subject, so much of what is being said here is my interpretation of the current literature on sexual responsivity in humans.*** I’ve already mentioned that scientists are beginning to consider behavioral addictions (like gambling…

  • Addiction brain effects : Opiate addiction – Heroin, oxycontin and more

    Okay, we’ve talked about crystal meth and cocaine and how they affect the brain during drug use. As I mentioned, both cocaine and meth interfere with the way the brain stores and cleans up important neurotransmitters, including, most importantly, Dopamine and Norepinephrine. The class of drugs known as opiates, which includes morphine, heroin, codeine, and…