Volitional social interaction prevents drug addiction in rat models
Open accessAbstract
Addiction treatment has not been appreciably improved by neuroscientific research. One problem is that mechanistic studies using rodent models do not incorporate volitional social factors, which play a critical role in human addiction. Here, using rats, we introduce an operant model of choice between drugs and social interaction. Independent of sex, drug class, drug dose, training conditions, abstinence duration, social housing, or addiction score in Diagnostic & Statistical Manual IV-based and intermittent access models, operant social reward prevented drug self-administration. This protection was lessened by delay or punishment of the social reward but neither measure was correlated with the addiction score. Social-choice-induced abstinence also prevented incubation of methamphetamine craving. This protective effect was associated with activation of central amygdala PKCδ-expressing inhibitory neurons and inhibition of anterior insular cortex activity. These findings highlight the need for incorporating social factors into neuroscience-based addiction research and support the wider implantation of socially based addiction treatments.
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The opportunity to interact with a fellow rat is protective against addiction-like behaviors.
“Others find that the opportunity to interact with a fellow rat is protective against addiction-like behaviors [71].”
From Addiction as a brain disease revised: why it still matters, and the need for consilience (2021) · cites this paper as [71]
The opportunity to socialize reduces drug seeking for both methamphetamine and heroin.
“the opportunity to socialize reduces drug seeking for both methamphetamine and heroin [145,146].”
From Neural circuits regulating prosocial behaviors (2023) · cites this paper as [145]
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- Authors
- Venniro, M., Zhang, M., Caprioli, D., Hoots, J. K., Golden, S. A., Heins, C., Morales, M., Epstein, D. H., & Shaham, Y.
- Affiliations
- National Institute on Drug Abuse (US)
- Fondazione Santa Lucia (IT)
- Corresponding author
- Shaham, Yavin
- ORCID
- Venue
- Nature Neuroscience
- Published
- 2018-10-15
- Volume
- 21
- Issue
- 11
- Pages
- 1520-1529
- ISSN
- 1097-6256 (ISSN-L)
- 1546-1726
- PMC
- PMC7386559
- OpenAlex
- W2897863430
- Cited by
- 342
- References
- 60
- Citations by year
- 2026: 22 · 2025: 36 · 2024: 49 · 2023: 41 · 2022: 58 · 2021: 50 · 2020: 53 · 2019: 31 · 2018: 2
- FWCI
- 15.49
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
- Locations
- Nature Neuroscience (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
- IRIS Research product catalog (Sapienza University of Rome) (submittedVersion)
- MPG.PuRe (Max Planck Society) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- National Institutes of Health
- National Institute on Drug Abuse (ZIADA000434)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience › Neurotransmitter Receptor Influence on Behavior
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Epidemiology › Substance Abuse Treatment and Outcomes
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Neural and Behavioral Psychology Studies
- Keywords
- drug addiction, social reward, self-administration, operant choice, social choice, incubation of craving, abstinence, central amygdala, anterior insula, addiction treatment
- MeSH terms
- Animals, Behavior, Animal, Conditioning, Operant, Disease Models, Animal, Female, Housing, Animal, Male, Self Administration, Social Behavior, Social Environment, Behavior, Addictive, Rats, Sprague-Dawley, Substance-Related Disorders, Rats, Drug-Seeking Behavior
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