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Impact of Short, Long, and Intermittent Access Conditions on MDPV and Cocaine Self‐administration in Male and Female Rats
Author(s) -
Doyle Michelle R.,
Sulima Agnieszka,
Rice Kenner C.,
Collins Gregory T.
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
the faseb journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.709
H-Index - 277
eISSN - 1530-6860
pISSN - 0892-6638
DOI - 10.1096/fasebj.2020.34.s1.04552
Subject(s) - self administration , addiction , psychology , medicine , drug , punishment (psychology) , drug intoxication , pharmacology , neuroscience , anesthesia , developmental psychology
Despite decades of research, the behavioral, pharmacological, and neurobiological determinants of one’s vulnerability to develop a substance use disorder are not well understood. When rats are allowed to self‐administer cocaine under short‐access conditions, patterns of drug intake tend to be well‐regulated; however, manipulating drug access conditions (e.g., long‐access and intermittent‐access) can produce neurobiological and behavioral changes thought to be related to addiction. In contrast to cocaine, when rats self‐administer the synthetic cathinone 3,4‐methylenedioxypyrovalerone (MDPV) under short access conditions, a subset display high levels of dysregulated drug‐taking behavior. However, MDPV has not been studied under extended access conditions, and it is unknown whether this MDPV phenotype is simply an earlier manifestation of the addiction‐like phenotype observed with cocaine, or whether the two phenotypes are qualitatively different. The current studies used male and female Sprague Dawley rats self‐administering MDPV (0.032 mg/kg/infusion) or cocaine (0.32 mg/kg/infusion) to test the hypotheses that (1) under short‐access conditions, rats self‐administering MDPV exhibit higher levels of drug taking, greater levels of responding when drug is not available, and reduced sensitivity to punishment by foot shock (i.e., addiction‐like behaviors); and (2) that 21 days of long‐ and intermittent‐access to MDPV or cocaine self‐administration will result in greater addiction‐like behaviors compared to short‐access self‐administration. After short‐access self‐administration, rats that self‐administer MDPV exhibit greater addiction‐related behaviors than rats self‐administering cocaine, as measured by the three criteria detailed above. Though long‐and intermittent‐access produce some changes in patterns of drug‐taking behavior, the access condition manipulation does not appear to systematically alter the addiction‐like behaviors in either rats self‐administering cocaine or MDPV. These results suggest that the phenotype displayed by rats self‐administering MDPV is not the same phenotype as that exhibited by rats with a history of self‐administering cocaine. Therefore, MDPV self‐administration may be a useful method to study individual differences in drug‐taking behavior under short‐access conditions. Support or Funding Information This work was supported by NIH/NIDA (R01 DA039146; GTC) and NIDA‐ and NIAAA‐IRPs (KCR).