Repeated cocaine exposure dysregulates cognitive control over cue-evoked reward-seeking behavior during Pavlovian-to-instrumental transfer.

ABSTRACT: Drug-paired cues acquire powerful motivational properties, but only lead to active drug-seeking behavior if they are potent enough to overwhelm the cognitive control processes that serve to suppress such urges. Studies using the Pavlovian-to-instrumental transfer (PIT) task have shown that rats pretreated with cocaine or amphetamine exhibit heightened levels of cue-motivated food-seeking behavior, suggesting that exposure to these drugs sensitizes the incentive motivational system. However, the PIT testing protocol can also create conflict between two competing behavioral responses to the reward-paired cue: active reward seeking (e.g., lever pressing) and passive conditioned food-cup approach behavior. We therefore investigated whether repeated cocaine exposure alters the way in which rats

SUBMITTER: Marshall AT 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6097769 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature