Sex, drugs and the brain

[0utrider]

Years ago, in a famous public service television ad, a hand cracked an egg and dropped it in a heated skillet. A male voice said, “This is your brain” (see the intact egg) and then “This is your brain on drugs” (see the egg frying, hear the skillet sizzle.) It must have been an effective ad because those of us who have reached a certain age all remember it years later, right?
They don’t show that ad anymore but federally-funded research by the University of Pennsylvania published this week made me think of it.

Researchers gave brain scans to 22 cocaine addicts while showing them quick subliminal cues such crack pipes and chunks of cocaine. The 33-millisecond images were too short to register consciously.
But even though the addicts weren’t aware of seeing them, the images lit up their limbic system, a region associated with emotion and reward.

Anna Rose Childress also found the brain regions activated by drug images overlapped with those activated by sexual images. The results were published Wednesday in PLOS One.

Some experts argue that scientists read too much into brain scan results these days, but the work has fascinating implications for researchers trying to find out why some people are more prone to addiction and have a harder time kicking drug habits than others. Obviously people are free to make choices, but I think the work tries to address a bit of what goes on in the brain to influence those choices.
The findings bolster arguments that drug addicts' brains work differently and that addiciton stimulates physiological changes in the brain. The result is that drugs activate regions most people use to recognize stimuli inherent for survival, such food and sex. The brain is programmed to recognize basic rewards that promote survival, and in addicts, cocaine and other drugs latch on to that system. Or so the researchers say.
More about the work in the article.

http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/news...the_brain.html

Reputation Comments on this post:

nice article, very interesting!

[cra$h]

swim believes that the reason people will often choose drugs over sex is because A) they last much longer than an orgasm B) for those who aren't very "lucky" drugs are guaranteed, while men/woman are not. C) there's no withdrawl from sex, making drug use more disirable for previous users

[Metomni]

Actually, this is a popular method of experimentation. Showing experiment participant's images that flash so quickly only their subconscious can register seeing it. I don't think it really proves much more than our mind can pick up on things that our sensory perception doesn't always detect.

I mean if you show those same people pictures of the same things for extended periods of time, then the limbic system would still be activated, it would just be still shots activating it instead of glimpses.

"The result is that drugs activate regions most people use to recognize stimuli inherent for survival, such food and sex. The brain is programmed to recognize basic rewards that promote survival, and in addicts, cocaine and other drugs latch on to that system. Or so the researchers say."

Or maybe there is ALSO an area for drugs, not just food and sex.

[Heretic.Ape.]

^^ the quick timing is used to separate which parts of the brain are involved in processing the information; the conscious higher cortex thoughts of "ooh, coke!" from more basic reactions.