Psychology Department,American University, Washington, DC 20016, USA.
Drug Alcohol Depend. 2012 Aug 1;124(3):283-7. doi: 10.1016/j.drugalcdep.2012.01.024. Epub 2012 Feb 21.
A method for reducing the power of drug cues could help in treating drug abuse and addiction. Extinction has been used, with mixed success, in such an effort. Research with non-drug cues has shown that simultaneously presenting (compounding) those cues during extinction can enhance the effectiveness of extinction. The present study investigated whether this procedure could be used to similarly deepen the extinction of cocaine cues.
Rats were first trained to self-administer cocaine during tone, click, and light stimuli. Then, these stimuli were subjected to extinction in an initial phase where they were presented individually. In a second extinction phase, one of the auditory stimuli (counterbalanced) was compounded with the light. The other auditory stimulus continued to be presented alone. Rats were then given a week of rest in their homecages prior to testing for spontaneous recovery of cocaine seeking.
The cue that was compounded with the light during the second phase of extinction training occasioned less spontaneous recovery of cocaine seeking than the cue that was always presented individually during extinction. Increasing the number of compound cue extinction sessions did not produce a greater deepened extinction effect.
The present study showed that simultaneously presenting already-extinguished cocaine cues during additional extinction training enhanced extinction. This extends the deepened extinction effect from non-drug cues to drug cues and further confirms predictions of error-correction learning theory. Incorporating deepened extinction into extinction-based drug abuse treatments could help to reduce the power of drug cues.
降低药物线索的力量可以帮助治疗药物滥用和成瘾。在这种努力中，已经使用了消退法，但效果不一。对非药物线索的研究表明，在消退过程中同时呈现（复合）这些线索可以提高消退的效果。本研究调查了这一程序是否可以用于类似地加深可卡因线索的消退。
首先，大鼠在声音、点击和灯光刺激下接受可卡因自我给药训练。然后，这些刺激在初始阶段进行消退，单独呈现。在第二阶段的消退中，一个听觉刺激（平衡）与光复合。另一个听觉刺激继续单独呈现。在进行可卡因寻求的自发恢复测试之前，大鼠在家中笼子里休息了一周。
在第二阶段的消退训练中，与总是单独呈现的线索相比，与光复合的线索引起的可卡因寻求自发恢复较少。增加复合线索消退次数并没有产生更大的深度消退效应。
本研究表明，在额外的消退训练中同时呈现已经消退的可卡因线索会增强消退。这将深度消退效应从非药物线索扩展到药物线索，并进一步证实了错误纠正学习理论的预测。将深度消退纳入基于消退的药物滥用治疗中可能有助于降低药物线索的力量。
