Unit V

1. Unit V Module 25

2. Altering Consciousness Drugs Dependence/Addiction • Many psychoactive drugs can be harmful to the body. • Psychoactive drugs are particularly dangerous when a person develops an addiction or becomes dependent on the substance. • Factors related to addiction: • tolerance • withdrawal • impact on daily life of substance use • physical and psychological dependence Psychoactive drugs are chemicals introduced into the body which alter perceptions, mood, and other elements of conscious experience.

3. Tolerance Tolerance of a drug refers to the diminished psychoactive effects after repeated use. Tolerance feeds addiction because users take increasing amounts of a drug to get the desired effect. This is neuroadaptation This happens because the brain changes to offset the effect of the drug Because marijuana stays in your system, you actually need less to get the same effect

4. Addiction • Increasing doses of the drug can pose a serious threat to the user and even lead to addiction. • The person craves the drug despite its adverse consequences. • 90 million people world wide suffer from problems related to alcohol and other drugs • Many people try to stop drug and alcohol use but they suffer the undesirable effects of withdrawal.

5. Withdrawal • After the benefits of a substance wear off, especially after tolerance has developed, drug users may experience withdrawal (painful symptoms of the body readjusting to the absence of the drug). Indicates a physical dependence • Withdrawal worsens addiction because users want to resume taking the drug to end withdrawal symptoms.

6. Dependence In psychological dependence, a person’s resources for coping with daily life wither as a drug becomes “needed” to relax, socialize, or sleep. In physical dependence, the body has been altered in ways that create cravings for the drug (e.g. to end withdrawal symptoms).

7. Dependence on a substance (or activity?) • Tolerance: the need to use more to receive the desired effect • Withdrawal: the distress experienced when the “high” subsides. Using more than intended • Persistent, failed attempts to regulate use • Much time spent preoccupied with the substance, obtaining it, and recovering • Important activities reduced because of use • Continued use despite aversive consequences

8. Depressants are chemicals that reduce neural activity and other body functions. Depressants Examples: • alcohol • barbiturates • opiates

9. alcohol • Alcohol is a depressant. It slows brain activity that allows for judgment and inhibitions. It is a disinhibitor. That’s why people may seem more lively or talkative when they first start to drink. • This disinhibition often leads to reckless sexual behavior. You are more likely to act upon certain urges because your judgment centers are turned off. • Drinking also reduces worries about drinking and driving • If heavy drinking follows a period of moderate drinking, the vomiting response is depressed. People poison themselves with an overdose that their bodies would normally throw up. • Women become addicted more quickly because of a lack of an enzyme that digests the alcohol. Also leads to more cases of lung, brain, and liver damage at lower consumption levels.

10. Effects of Alcohol Use Chronic Use: Brain damage Impact on functioning • Slow neural processing, reduced sympathetic nervous system activity, and slower thought and physical reaction. Feel more relaxed. • Reduced memory formation caused by disrupted REM sleep and reduced synapse formation. This is what creates black outs. • Impaired self-control, impaired judgment, self-monitoring, and inhibition; increased accidents and aggression. Reduces self-awareness may explain why people drink to suppress awareness of short comings or failures. • Even the expectation of what alcohol will do to you will effect your behavior. May act more carelessly.

11. Barbiturates Barbiturates are tranquilizers--drugs that depress central nervous system activity. • Examples: Nembutal, Seconal, Amytal • Effects: reducing anxiety and inducing sleep. • Problems: reducing memory, judgment, and concentration; can lead to death if combined with alcohol. In large doses, it can impair memory and judgement.

12. Opiates: Highly Addictive Depressants • Opiates depress nervous system activity; this reduces anxiety, and especially reduces pain. Herion, codeine, and morphine • High doses of opiates produce euphoria. • Opiates work at receptor sites for the body’s natural pain reducers (endorphins). • Long term, users crave the drug, need larger doses, and painful withdrawal. • The brain stops making endorphins so that stopping usage of the drug is extremely painful Opiatesare chemicals such as morphine and heroin that are made from the opium poppy.

13. Morphine • Used as a pain reliever • Mainly for terminal cancer patients or post surgery pain management • Reduces pain, loss of appetite • Once injected or ingested, it enters the blood stream which carries it to the brain and other part of the body where opioid receptors exist. • Can cause respiratory depression or sleepiness

14. Morphine became widely used by injured soldiers. Morphine addiction became known as “soldier’s disease”. • It can cause and allergic reaction in the skin. • Shrunken pupils • Hallucinations and confusion • Highly addictive

15. Heroin • Usually appears as a white or brown powder or as a black, sticky substance. • Can be injected, snorted, or smoked. • High risk of addiction because it is quickly sent to the brain. • It immediately becomes morphine in the brain.

16. Heroin • Opioid receptors are located in many areas of the body, especially in areas of pain and reward. • Also located in the brain stem which controls automatic processes critical or life such as arousal, blood pressure and respiration • Herion overdose usually involves a suppression of breathing. This affects the amount of oxygen in the brain. (Hypoxia) • Herion users say they feel a surge of euphoria with dry mouth, warm flushing of the skin, heavy arms and legs and clouded mental functioning.

17. Long-term uses causes dependence. They use the drug to avoid withdrawal symptoms • Deterioration of the brain’s grey matter • Can cause collapsed veins, infection of the heart, liver and kidney disease. • Infants born addicted to heroin suffer from neonatal abstinence syndrome (NAS)

18. Stimulants are drugs which intensify neural activity and bodily functions. Stimulants Some physical effects of stimulants: dilated pupils, increased breathing and heart rate, increased blood sugar, decreased appetite Examples of stimulants: • Caffeine • Nicotine • Amphetamines, Methamphetamine • Cocaine • Ecstasy

19. stimulants • Amphetamines are a type of stimulant. • It is a central nervous system stimulant that affects chemicals in the brain and nerves. • It has been used to treat obesity, ADHD, and narcolepsy.

20. Nicotine The main effect of nicotine use is ADDICTION.

21. Why do people smoke? • Starting to smoke: invited by peers, influenced by culture and media • Continuing: positively reinforced by physically stimulating effects • Not stopping: after regular use, smokers have difficulty stopping because of withdrawal symptoms such as insomnia, anxiety, distractibility, and irritability. As addictive as heroin and cocaine. • Within 7 seconds, a cigarette will calm the user. • Over half American who smoke have quit. Stats are the same if you stop gradually or abruptly. Smoking does correlate to depression and divorce.

22. Caffeine • adds energy • disrupts sleep for 3-4 hours • can lead to withdrawal symptoms if used daily: • headaches • irritability • fatigue • difficulty concentrating • depression

23. What happens next? • Euphoria crashes into a state worse than before taking the drug, with agitation, depression, and pain. • Users develop tolerance; over time, withdrawal symptoms of cocaine use get worse, and users take more just to feel normal. • Cycles of overdose and withdrawal can sometimes bring convulsions, violence, heart attack, and death. Cocaine snorted, injected or smoked • Cocaine blocks reuptake (and thus increases levels at the synapse of: • dopamine (feels rewarding). • serotonin (lifts mood). • norepinephrine (provides energy). • Effect on consciousness: Euphoria!!! Feelings of self-confidence and increased heart rate. At least for 45 minutes…it depletes the brains supply of feel good neurotransmitters so the crash is extremely hard. • Creates aggressive and violent behavior. • Crack is a crystallized form of cocaine with a more intense high but stronger crash

24. Methamphetamine • Methamphetamine triggers the sustained release of dopamine, sometimes leading to eight hours of euphoria and energy. • What happens next: irritability, insomnia, seizures, hypertension, violence, depression • “Meth” addiction can become all-consuming. From 1998 to 2002: Extreme Makeover, Meth Edition

25. Ecstasy/MDMA(MethyleneDioxyMethAmphetamine) • Ecstasy is a synthetic stimulant that increases dopamine and greatly increases serotonin and stops reuptake. • Effects on consciousness: euphoria, CNS stimulation, hallucinations, and artificial feeling of social connectedness and intimacy for about 3 or 4 hours What Happens Next? • In the short run, regretted behavior, dehydration, overheating, and high blood pressure. • Make it past that, and you might have: • damaged serotonin-producing neurons, causing permanently depressed mood • disrupted sleep and circadian rhythm • impaired memory and slowed thinking • suppressed immune system

26. Ecstasy • In the 1990’s, ecstasy became known as a “club drug”. • This were taken at clubs and all night raves. • 60 million tablets consumed annually in Britain. • Ecstasy causes dehydration which occurs after hours of dancing. Users overheat, have increased blood pressure and death. • Slows memory, thought and disrupts sleep

27. Hallucinogens Marijuana/THC: What Happens Next? • Impaired motor coordination, perceptual ability, and reaction time • THC accumulates in the body, increasing the effects of next use. Lingers for a week or more. • Over time, the brain shrinks in areas processing memory and emotion • Smoke inhalation damage LSD (lysergic acid diethylamide) • LSD and similar drugs interfere with serotonin transmission. • This causes hallucinations--images and other “sensations” that didn’t come in through the senses. Marijuana/THC (delta-9-TetraHydroCannabinol) • Marijuana binds with brain cannabinoid receptors. • Effect on consciousness: • amplifies sensations • disinhibits impulses • euphoric mood • lack of ability to sense satiety

28. LSD • Chemist Albert Hofmann accidently ingested LSD, which he created. He suffered from a stream of fantastic pictures, extraordinary shapes with intense colors. • The brain hallucinates in basically the same way. • Simple geometric figures, then more meaningful images or past emotional experiences. They feel separated from their body which causes panic or they harm themselves.

29. These sensations are similar to near-death experiences. • This leads us to believe that the brain under stress manufactures a near death experience. • Temporal lobe seizures create the same effect as well.

30. Marijuana • Hemp has been grown for years for its fiber. • The leaves and flowers contain THC. When smoked, it takes 7 seconds to get to the brain. When eaten, it takes longer. • Synthetic marijuana is called K2 or Spice • It can be classified as a hallucinogen as well as a depressant • Stays in the body for about a week

31. A person’s experience can vary with the situation. • The age of the user and the amount can have different effects. • Some states and countries have legalized marijuana. Legal medical marijuana has been used to relieve pain from AIDS, glaucoma, and cancer. • It is recommended to use inhalers with THC

32. addiction • Viewing addiction as a disease can undermine people’s self-confidence and their belief that they can change. • Many people do voluntarily stop using without treatment • Most smokers stop on their own • Labeling a behavior as an addiction doesn’t always explain it. • Most people recover completely on their own, by attending self-help groups or seeing a counselor or therapist • Most substance abusers require care for months or even years. • There are drugs available to help with addiction as maintenance therapy

33. Most successful programs use researched techniques such as cognitive behavior therapy with helps addicts recognize what prompts them to use and redirects their thoughts and actions • This supports a recent study on addiction. • Caged rats were given drugged water (cocaine) • Rats that were in a cage all alone became addicted • Rats that had “good lives” actually shunned it. • The alone and unhappy rats became heavy users.

34. To further the study, rats that were heavy users were taken from the boring cages after 57 days • He placed them in the RAT PARK and they had a few moments of withdrawal but they soon stopped their heavy use and had a normal life. • Patients that are given morphine do not leave the hospital addicts. • Most soldiers who were addicts in Vietnam came home and stopped using without any therapy or rehab

35. 15 years ago Portugal had on of the worst drug problems in Europe. • They decriminalized all drug and transferred that money to reconnecting addicts to their feelings and society. • Addiction has fallen and injecting drugs has fallen by 50%. • Supports the idea that human beings are bonding animals. We need to connect and love • The isolation we create with an individualist society and with the internet itself can foster the drug culture.

36. Summary: Desired Effects of Drugs

37. Summary: Aversive Effects of Drugs

38. Prevalence of Drug Use in the United States Nicotine Use as of 2011: 26 percent of high school dropouts smoke; 6 percent of people with graduate degrees smoke

39. What influences can lead to drug use?