Objective: Epidemiological studies indicate that experimentation with addictive drugs and onset of addictive disorders is primarily concentrated in adolescence and young adulthood. The authors describe basic and clinical data supporting adolescent neurodevelopment as a biologically critical period of greater vulnerability for experimentation with substances and acquisition of substance use disorders. Method: The authors reviewed recent literature regarding neurocircuitry underlying motivation, impulsivity, and addiction, with a focus on studies investigating adolescent neurodevelopment. Results: Adolescent neurodevelopment occurs in brain regions associated with motivation, impulsivity, and addiction. Adolescent impulsivity and/or novelty seeking as a transitional trait behavior can be explained in part by maturational changes in frontal cortical and subcortical monoaminergic systems. These developmental processes may advantageously promote learning drives for adaptation to adult roles but may also confer greater vulnerability to the addictive actions of drugs. Conclusions: An exploration of developmental changes in neurocircuitry involved in impulse control has significant implications for understanding adolescent behavior, addiction vulnerability, and the prevention of addiction in adolescence and adulthood.

/pdf/developmental-neurocircuitry-of-motivation-in-adolescence-a-13aw97d4bw.pdf

Developmental Neurocircuitry of Motivation in Adolescence: A Critical Period of Addiction Vulnerability

We present a brief overview of the incentive sensitization theory of addiction. This posits that addiction is caused primarily by drug-induced sensitization in the brain mesocorticolimbic systems that attribute incentive salience to reward-associated stimuli. If rendered hypersensitive, these systems cause pathological incentive motivation (‘wanting’) for drugs. We address some current questions including: what is the role of learning in incentive sensitization and addiction? Does incentive sensitization occur in human addicts? Is the development of addiction-like behaviour in animals associated with sensitization? What is the best way to model addiction symptoms using animal models? And, finally, what are the roles of affective pleasure or withdrawal in addiction?

/pdf/the-incentive-sensitization-theory-of-addiction-some-current-ecx0hketlf.pdf

The incentive sensitization theory of addiction: some current issues

Impulsivity as a vulnerability marker for substance-use disorders: Review of findings from high-risk research, problem gamblers and genetic association studies

Executive function (EF), which refers to the more deliberate, top-down neurocognitive processes involved in self-regulation, develops most rapidly during the preschool years, together with the growth of neural networks involving prefrontal cortex but continues to develop well into adulthood. Both EF and the neural systems supporting EF vary as a function of motivational significance, and this article discusses the distinction between the top-down processes that operate in motivationally and emotionally significant situations (“hot EF”) and the top-down processes that operate is more affectively neutral contexts (“cool EF”). Emerging evidence indicates that both hot and cool EF are surprisingly malleable, with implications for intervention and prevention.

pdf/hot-and-cool-executive-function-in-childhood-and-adolescence-q899yta0mv.pdf

Hot and Cool Executive Function in Childhood and Adolescence: Development and Plasticity

A decade ago, we hypothesized that drug addiction can be viewed as a transition from voluntary, recreational drug use to compulsive drug-seeking habits, neurally underpinned by a transition from prefrontal cortical to striatal control over drug seeking and taking as well as a progression from the ventral to the dorsal striatum. Here, in the light of burgeoning, supportive evidence, we reconsider and elaborate this hypothesis, in particular the refinements in our understanding of ventral and dorsal striatal mechanisms underlying goal-directed and habitual drug seeking, the influence of drug-associated Pavlovian-conditioned stimuli on drug seeking and relapse, and evidence for impairments in top-down prefrontal cortical inhibitory control over this behavior. We further review animal and human studies that have begun to define etiological factors and individual differences in the propensity to become addicted to drugs, leading to the description of addiction endophenotypes, especially for cocaine addiction. We consider the prospect of novel treatments for addiction that promote abstinence from and relapse to drug use.

Drug Addiction: Updating Actions to Habits to Compulsions Ten Years On

Decision-making deficits, linked to a dysfunctional ventromedial prefrontal cortex, revealed in alcohol and stimulant abusers.

Decision-making and addiction (part II): myopia for the future or hypersensitivity to reward?

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Decision-making deficits, linked to a dysfunctional ventromedial prefrontal cortex, revealed in alcohol and stimulant abusers.

Decision-making and addiction (part II): myopia for the future or hypersensitivity to reward?