SCIENCE IN THE NEWS DAILY
Primed for Addiction?
from ScienceNOW Daily News
Families hand down many things from one generation to the next--and addiction can be one of them. A child of drug-addicted parents is eight times more
likely to become an addict than a child growing up in a drug-free home. But genes aren't everything. Even in families whose very brains seem primed for
addiction, some children still go on to lead productive lives free of drugs, according to new research.
Behavioral neuroscientist Karen Ersche of the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom and colleagues had set out to examine whether drug abusers
begin life with miswired brain circuitry or merely end up that way. Imaging studies of addicts show dramatic differences in brain areas involved in
motivation, reward, and self-control, to name just a few.
But it's less clear whether these differences are the cause or the effect of drug abuse. Because both addiction and brain structure are likely to be
inherited traits, many researchers suspect that drug abusers have faulty brain circuitry based in their genes.
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