Word: addict
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...course, not everyone becomes an addict. That's because we have other, more analytical regions that can evaluate consequences and override mere pleasure seeking. Brain imaging is showing exactly how that happens. Paulus, for example, looked at methamphetamine addicts enrolled in a VA hospital's intensive four-week rehabilitation program. Those who were more likely to relapse in the first year after completing the program were also less able to complete tasks involving cognitive skills and less able to adjust to new rules quickly. This suggested that those patients might also be less adept at using analytical areas...
...kind of damage that lingers in an addict's learning abilities also hangs on in behavioral areas, this could explain why rehabilitation programs that rely on cognitive therapy--teaching new ways to think about the need for a substance and the consequences of using it--may not always be effective, especially in the first weeks and months after getting clean. "Therapy is a learning process," notes Vocci. "We are trying to get [addicts] to change cognition and behavior at a time when they are least able...
...long it takes for the brain to reset itself and shake off the immediate influence of a drug. Researchers at Yale University have documented what they call the sleeper effect--a gradual re-engaging of proper decision making and analytical functions in the brain's prefrontal cortex--after an addict has abstained for at least 90 days...
...drink, I had long since learned ways to talk myself out of it--or find someone to help me do so. Like the 90-day drying-out period that turns out to parallel the brain's recovery cycle, such a strategy is in line with other new theories of addiction. Scientists say extinguishing urges is not a matter of getting the feelings to fade but of helping the addict learn a new form of conditioning, one that allows the brain's cognitive power to shout down the amygdala and other lower regions. "What has to happen for that...
Such surprises have even allowed experts to speculate whether addiction can ever be cured. That notion goes firmly against current beliefs. A rehabilitated addict is always in recovery because cured suggests that resuming drinking or smoking or shooting up is a safe possibility--whose downside could be devastating. But there are hints that a cure might not in principle be impossible. A recent study showed that tobacco smokers who suffered a stroke that damaged the insula (a region of the brain involved in emotional, gut-instinct perceptions) no longer felt a desire for nicotine...