Alcohol seeking by rats becomes habitual after prolonged training

  1. Matías López 1
  2. Alberto Soto 1
  3. Stefana Bura 1
  1. 1 Universidad de Oviedo (España)
Zeitschrift:
Psicothema

ISSN: 0214-9915

Datum der Publikation: 2016

Ausgabe: 28

Nummer: 4

Seiten: 421-427

Art: Artikel

Andere Publikationen in: Psicothema

Zusammenfassung

Background: This study examines the effect of the amount of training on alcohol seeking behavior in rats. Contemporary theories of instrumental learning suggest that habit learning processes are involved in the development of the compulsive drug seeking that characterizes addiction. Method: Wistar rats were trained to perform an instrumental response for a solution of ethanol. In Experiment 1, the rats received 2 instrumental training sessions, whereas animals in Experiment 2 received 2, 8, or 16 sessions. An aversion was then conditioned to ethanol by pairing it with LiCl, and the performance in extinction was subsequently tested. Results: Instrumental responding showed variable sensitivity to outcome devaluation as a function of the length of training. After 2 and 8 training sessions, but not after 16 sessions, drug seeking was influenced by a change in the value of ethanol. Conclusions: The results suggest that alcohol seeking is more flexible and goal-directed in early stages of training, but it becomes habitual and less governed by its consequences with more extended training.

Informationen zur Finanzierung

This research was supported by grants to Mat?as L?pez (Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness of Spain, project n? PSI2012-34743), and Alberto Soto (Regional Government of Asturias, project n? BP11-059).

Geldgeber

    • PSI2012-34743

Bibliographische Referenzen

  • Adams, C. D. (1982). Variations in the sensitivity of instrumental responding to reinforcer devaluation. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 34B, 77-98.
  • Adams, C. D., & Dickinson, A. (1981). Instrumental responding following reinforcer devaluation. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 33B, 109-121.
  • Cardinal, R. N., & Everitt, B. J. (2004). Neural and psychological mechanisms underlying links to drug addiction. Current Opinion in Neurobiology, 14, 156-162.
  • Colwill, R. M., & Rescorla, R. A. (1985). Post-conditioning devaluation of a reinforcer affects instrumental responding. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes, 11, 120-132.
  • Colwill, R. M., & Triola, S. M. (2002). Instrumental reesponding remains under the control of the consequent outcome after extended training. Behavioural Processes, 57, 51-64.
  • Corbit, L-H., & Janak, P. H. (2007). Ethanol-associated cues produce general Pavlovian-instrumental transfer. Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, 31, 766-774.
  • Cunningham, C. L., Fidler, T. L., & Hill, K. G. (2000). Animal models of alcohol’s motivational effects. Alcohol Research & Health, 24, 85-92.
  • de Wit, S., & Dickinson, A. (2009). Associative theories of goaldirected behaviour: A case for animal-human translational models. Psychological Research, 73, 463-476.
  • Deroche-Gamonet, V., Belin, D., & Piazza, P. V. (2004). Evidence for addiction-like behavior in the rat. Science, 305, 1014-1017.
  • Dickinson, A. (1995). Actions and habits: the development of behavioral autonomy. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological Sciences, 308, 67-78.
  • Dickinson, A., Balleine, B. W. (1994). Motivational control of goaldirected action. Animal Learning & Behavior, 22, 1-18.
  • Dickinson, A., Wood, N., & Smith, J. W. (2002). Alcohol seeking by rats: Action or habit? Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 55B, 331-348.
  • Everitt, B. J, & Robbins, T. W. (2005). Neural systems of reinforcement for drug addiction: from action to habits to compulsion. Nature Neuroscience, 8, 1481-1489.
  • Glasner, S. V., Overmier, J. B., & Balleine B. W. (2005). The role of Pavlovian cues in alcohol seeking in dependent and nondependent rats. Journal of Studies on Alcohol, 66, 53-61.
  • Hogarth, L., Dickinson, A., & Duka, T. (2010). The associative basis of cue elicited drug taking in humans. Psychopharmacology, 208, 337-351.
  • Hutcheson, D. M., Everitt, B. J., Robbins, T. W., & Dickinson, A. (2001). The role of withdrawal in heroin addiction: Enhances reward or promotes avoidance? Nature Neuroscience, 4, 943-947.
  • Koob, G. F. (2000). Animal models of craving for ethanol. Addiction, 95, 73-81.
  • Koob, G. F., & Le Moal, M. (2006). Neurobiology of addiction. London: Academic Press.
  • Mangieri, R. A., Cofresí, U., & Gonzales, R. A. (2012). Ethanol seeking by Long Evans rats is not always a goal-directed behavior. PloS One, 7, 1-13.
  • Miles, F. J., Everitt, B. J., & Dickinson, A. (2003). Oral cocaine seeking by rats: Action or habit? Behavioral Neuroscience, 117, 927-938.
  • Nelson, A., & Killcross, S. (2006). Amphetamine exposure enhances habit formation. Journal of Neuroscience, 26, 3805-3812.
  • Olmstead, M. C. (2006). Animal models of drug addiction: Where do we go from here? Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 59, 625-653.
  • Olmstead, M. C., Lafond, M. V., Everitt, B. J., & Dickinson, A. (2001). Cocaine seeking by rats is a goal-directed action. Behavioral Neuroscience, 115, 394-402.
  • Ostlund, S. B., Maidment, N. T., & Balleine, B. W. (2010). Alcohol-paired contextual cues produce an immediate and selective loss of goaldirected action in rats. Frontiers in Integrative Neuroscience, 4, 1-8.
  • Panlilio, L. V., & Goldberg, S. R. (2007). Self-administration of drugs in animals and humans as a model and a investigative tool. Addiction, 102, 1863-1870.
  • Robinson, T. E., & Berridge, K. C. (2003). Addiction. Annual Review of Psychology, 54, 25-53.
  • Samson, H. H., Cunningham, C. L., Czachowski, C. L., Chappell, A., Legg, B., & Shannon, E. (2004). Devaluation and ethanol reinforcement. Alcohol, 32, 203-212.
  • Sanchis-Segura, C., & Spanagel, R. (2006). Behavioural assessment of drug reinforcement and addictive features in rodents: An overview. Addiction Biology, 11, 2-38.
  • Shaham, Y., Shalev, U., Lu, L., De Wit, H., & Stewart, J. (2003). The reinstatement model of drug relapse: History, methodology and major findings. Psychopharmacology, 168, 3-20.
  • Shalev, U., Grimm J. W., & Shaham, Y. (2002) Neurobiology of relapse to heroin and cocaine seeking: A review. Pharmacological Reviews, 54, 1-42.
  • Spanagel, R. (2000). Recent animal models of alcoholism. Alcohol Research & Health, 24, 124-131.
  • Tabakoff, B., & Hoffman, P. L. (2000). Animal models in alcohol research. Alcohol Research & Health, 24, 77-84.
  • Thrailkill, E. A., & Bouton, M. E. (2015). Contextual control of instrumental actions and habits. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Learning and Cognition, 41, 69-80.
  • Vanderschuren, L. J., & Everitt, B. J. (2004). Drug seeking becomes compulsive after prolonged cocaine self-administrationr. Science, 305, 1017-1019.
  • Vanderschuren, L. J., & Everitt, B. J. (2005). Behavioral and neural mechanisms of compulsive drug seeking. European Journal of Pharmacology, 526, 77-88.
  • Zapata, A., Minney, V. L., & Shippenberg, T. S. (2010). Shift from goaldirected to habitual cocaine seeking after prolonged experience in rats. Journal of Neuroscience, 30, 15457-15463.