Studying Addiction

About the lecture

In this lecture, we think about how drug addiction is studied, focusing in particular on: (i) substance use disorder as the clinical term for the condition commonly described as a drug addiction; (ii) defining substance use disorder, primarily centring around continued substance seeking and use, despite negative consequences; (iii) the eleven categories used to diagnose substance use disorder; (iv) the behavioural phases of a substance use disorder, starting with binge usage, moving to compulsive/problematic drug use and finishing with the withdrawal phase; (v) the distinction between clinical and preclinical studies of addiction; (vi) the limitation of studies on humans, from technical and ethical perspectives, which mean animal models can be very useful.

About the lecturer

Dr Lauren Burgeno is a National Science Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Physiology, Anatomy and Genetics at the University of Oxford. Dr Burgeno’s research interests are in the mechanisms by which striatal acetylcholine gates cue-elicited dopamine release and how this contributes to addiction related behaviour. Some of Dr Burgeno’s recent publications include 'Time-dependent assessment of stimulus-evoked regional dopamine release' (2019) and 'Genetic isolation of hypothalamic neurons that regulate context-specific male social behaviour' (2016).