Blunted ventral striatal responses to anticipated rewards foreshadow problematic drug use in novelty-seeking adolescents.

ABSTRACT: Novelty-seeking tendencies in adolescents may promote innovation as well as problematic impulsive behaviour, including drug abuse. Previous research has not clarified whether neural hyper- or hypo-responsiveness to anticipated rewards promotes vulnerability in these individuals. Here we use a longitudinal design to track 144 novelty-seeking adolescents at age 14 and 16 to determine whether neural activity in response to anticipated rewards predicts problematic drug use. We find that diminished BOLD activity in mesolimbic (ventral striatal and midbrain) and prefrontal cortical (dorsolateral prefrontal cortex) regions during reward anticipation at age 14 predicts problematic drug use at age 16. Lower psychometric conscientiousness and steeper discounting of future rewards at age 14 also pred

SUBMITTER: Buchel C 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5321762 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature