“Liking” and “Wanting” Linked to Reward Deficiency Syndrome (RDS): Hypothesizing Differential Responsivity in Brain Reward Circuitry
Open accessAbstract
In an attempt to resolve controversy regarding the causal contributions of mesolimbic dopamine (DA) systems to reward, we evaluate the three main competing explanatory categories: "liking,""learning," and "wanting" [1]. That is, DA may mediate (a) the hedonic impact of reward (liking), (b) learned predictions about rewarding effects (learning), or (c) the pursuit of rewards by attributing incentive salience to reward-related stimuli (wanting). We evaluate these hypotheses, especially as they relate to the Reward Deficiency Syndrome (RDS), and we find that the incentive salience or "wanting" hypothesis of DA function is supported by a majority of the evidence. Neuroimaging studies have shown that drugs of abuse, palatable foods, and anticipated behaviors such as sex and gaming affect brain regions involving reward circuitry, and may not be unidirectional. Drugs of abuse enhance DA signaling and sensitize mesolimbic mechanisms that evolved to attribute incentive salience to rewards. Addictive drugs have in common that they are voluntarily selfadministered, they enhance (directly or indirectly) dopaminergic synaptic function in the nucleus accumbens (NAC), and they stimulate the functioning of brain reward circuitry (producing the "high" that drug users seek). Although originally believed simply to encode the set point of hedonic tone, these circuits now are believed to be functionally more complex, also encoding attention, reward expectancy, disconfirmation of reward expectancy, and incentive motivation. Elevated stress levels, together with polymorphisms of dopaminergic genes and other neurotransmitter genetic variants, may have a cumulative effect on vulnerability to addiction. The RDS model of etiology holds very well for a variety of chemical and behavioral addictions.
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Individuals with reward deficiencies may be particularly prone to developing incentive sensitization.
“Individuals with reward de fi ciencies may be particularly prone to developing incentive sensitization (Blum et al., 2012).”
From The Interaction of Person-Affect-Cognition-Execution (I-PACE) model for addictive behaviors: Update, generalization to addictive behaviors beyond internet-use disorders, and specification of the process character of addictive behaviors (2019) · cites this paper as Blum et al., 2012
The “Relapse and DA Super-Sensitivity at Receptors” section proposes that people with reduced D2 receptors may have supersensitive remaining receptors and heightened responses during reward anticipation (page unavailable). This supports a possible link between reward deficiency and heightened reward responsiveness, but the paper does not say such individuals are particularly prone to developing incentive sensitization. (LLM, conf=0.79)
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- Authors
- Blum, K., Gardner, E., Oscar-Berman, M., & Gold, M.
- Affiliations
- University of Florida (US)
- National Institute on Drug Abuse (US)
- Venue
- Current Pharmaceutical Design
- Publisher
- Bentham Science Publishers Ltd.
- Published
- 2012-01-01
- Volume
- 18
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 113-118
- ISSN
- 1381-6128 (ISSN-L)
- PMC
- PMC3651846
- OpenAlex
- W2127079332
- Cited by
- 218
- References
- 56
- Citations by year
- 2026: 9 · 2025: 7 · 2024: 10 · 2023: 7 · 2022: 11 · 2021: 8 · 2020: 51 · 2019: 11 · 2018: 7 · 2017: 12 · 2016: 13 · 2015: 19 · 2014: 25 · 2013: 18 · 2012: 9
- FWCI
- 9.36
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
- Locations
- Current Pharmaceutical Design (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (acceptedVersion)
- PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
- Funders
- National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (R01 AA07112, K05AA00219, R01AA007112, K05AA000219)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience › Neurotransmitter Receptor Influence on Behavior
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Neural and Behavioral Psychology Studies
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Gambling Behavior and Treatments
- Keywords
- reward deficiency syndrome, incentive salience, wanting, liking, mesolimbic dopamine system, brain reward system, nucleus accumbens, addiction, self-administration, reward expectancy, stress, behavioral addiction, chemical dependence
- MeSH terms
- Animals, Brain, Dopamine, Humans, Reward, Syndrome, Signal Transduction, Behavior, Addictive, Substance-Related Disorders, Neuroimaging
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