Utility of preclinical drug versus food choice procedures to evaluate candidate medications for methamphetamine use disorder

Substance use disorders are diagnosed as a manifestation of inappropriate behavioral allocation toward abused drugs and away from other behaviors maintained by more adaptive nondrug reinforcers (e.g., money and social relationships). Substance use disorder treatment goals include not only decreasing drug‐maintained behavior but also promoting behavioral reallocation toward these socially adaptive alternative reinforcers. Preclinical drug self‐administration procedures that offer concurrent access to both drug and nondrug reinforcers provide a translationally relevant dependent measure of behavioral allocation that may be useful for candidate medication evaluation. In contrast to other abused drugs, such as heroin or cocaine, preclinical methamphetamine versus food choice procedures have been a more recent development. We hypothesize that preclinical to clinical translatability would be improved by the evaluation of repeated pharmacological treatment effects on methamphetamine self‐administration under a methamphetamine versus food choice procedure. In support of this hypothesis, a literature review suggests strong concordance between preclinical pharmacological treatment effects on methamphetamine versus food choice in nonhuman primates and clinical medication treatment effects on methamphetamine self‐administration in human laboratory studies or methamphetamine abuse metrics in clinical trials. In conclusion, this literature suggests preclinical methamphetamine versus food choice procedures may be useful in developing innovative pharmacotherapies for methamphetamine use disorder.