Alcohol-paired contextual cues produce an immediate and selective loss of goal-directed action in rats

Ostlund Ostlund

doi:10.3389/fnint.2010.00019

Abstract

We assessed whether the presence of contextual cues paired with alcohol would disrupt rats’ capacity to express appropriate goal-directed action control. Rats were first given differential context conditioning such that one set of contextual cues was paired with the injection of ethanol and a second, distinctive set of cues was paired with the injection of saline. All rats were then trained in a third, neutral context to press one lever for grain pellets and another lever for sucrose pellets. They were then given two extinction tests to evaluate their ability to choose between the two actions in response to the devaluation of one of the two food outcomes with one test conducted in the alcohol-paired context and the other conducted in the control (saline-paired) context. In the control context, rats exhibited goal-directed action control; i.e., they were able selectively to withhold the action that previously earned the now devalued outcome. However, these same rats were impaired when tested in the alcohol-paired context, performing both actions at the same rate regardless of the current value of their respective outcomes. Subsequent testing revealed that the rats were capable of overcoming this impairment if they were giving response-contingent feedback about the current value of the food outcomes. These results provide a clear demonstration of the disruptive influence that alcohol-paired cues can exert on decision-making in general and goal-directed action selection and choice in particular.

Highlights

Addiction may be viewed as a disorder of decision-making
The current study demonstrates that alcohol-paired environmental cues can disrupt decision-making; rats tested in a context that signaled alcohol intoxication were found to lack the capacity to select actions based on their anticipated outcomes
These rats were able to select their actions in a goal-directed manner when tested in a different context that had not been paired with alcohol, indicating that the influence of the alcohol-paired context on action selection was transitory, and was unlikely to be the product of persistent neuroadaptions induced by the alcohol exposure regimen

Summary

Introduction

Addiction may be viewed as a disorder of decision-making. Drug addicts compulsively seek out and use drugs even though such behavior can have devastating effects on their health and livelihood. Despite important differences between these individual accounts, this general hypothesis attempts to explain why under certain conditions addicts can sometimes act in their own best interest by abstaining from drug use but have difficulty doing so when confronted with drug-paired cues. This view predicts that such cues should interfere with all actions requiring planning or deliberation, not just those relating to drug use. In support of this claim, it has been shown that imagery that provokes cigarette craving in smokers (Sayette and Hufford, 1994; Cepeda-Benito and Tiffany, 1996)

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Results

Conclusion