029 — (GRA0175) Locomotor sensitization to repeated administration of cocaine in mice previously classified by a learning strategy in the elevated plus maze

Abstract

Rationale: Drug addiction is a psychiatric disorder characterized by loss of control over drug use and by compulsive drug seeking and intake, as well as relapse that may occur even after long periods of abstinence. Recently, it has been hypothesized that drug addiction can be viewed as the endpoint of a series of transitions from initially controlled voluntary drug use to the loss of control over this behavior, such that it becomes habitual, automatic, and compulsive. At the neural level, this transition may represent a progression from ventral to more dorsal domains of the striatum, mediated at least in part by its “spiraling” striatonigrostriatal dopaminergic circuitry.