On The Road..

    SO, what causes someone to become addicted to drugs? Is it bad genes? Is it an Addictive Personality disorder? What is it really?  According to an article written by Erik Goldman, that I found searching the Westminster Library online database, titled Response, Addiction to Cocaine Hinge on Gender, gender may play a huge role. Goldman states that men and women respond very differently to cocaine and he says that these differences have important clinical implications. When men and women inhale the same amount of the substance, men tend to absorb the cocaine faster and experience a more immediate euphoric response than women. Goldman says that these gender differences are largely influenced by sex hormones. Estrogen controls nasal mucus thickness, which plays a part in decreasing the absorbency levels in women. Men are also more sensitive to the brain damaging effects of cocaine. Also interesting, women generally become drug free more quickly and have better long term drug free response rates than men do. Reasons for this are not entirely clear. Could hormones have a hand in how someone become addicted?

    After reading that article, I decided to look more into genes and addiction. I was lead to another article, on the same database, by Linda Martin-Morris, Helen T. Bikkland, and Susanna L. Cummingham called Can Your Genes "Make You Do It"?. This article states that 40-60% of the addiction trait is controlled by gene products. I.e. the risk of becoming an alcoholic is elevated five-to eightfold if a primary relative is an alcoholic. Interestingly, Identical twins show more sharing of alcoholism than fraternal twins. I imagine this holds true for other substances and even other forms of addiction. According to this article, nearly 1500 genes out of the human genome of some 25,000, have been implicated in some way to addiction.


After that the article got a bit complicated to read and my mind started to wander and again I was wondering about how drugs affect the brain.

      SO now, I am lead to a different article, same database, entitled Addiction, written by Melissa Abramovitz.  She says Psychoactive drugs (mind-altering) change the way the mind works. Over time, these drugs trick the mind and body into thinking they need more and more of the drug. Many addicts develop both physical (withdrawal, tolerance) and psychological (cravings) addictions, or dependence. Addictive drugs act on the neurotransmitters or the chemical messengers in the brain, by changing the amount of these chemicals and their response. She also claims that researchers have found several genes linked to nicotine, cocaine and alcoholism, which is supported by the previous article.  Abramovitz says people who become addicted to one drug are more likely to become addicted to others.

   Overall, what I have learned here is that genes most likely do play a factor in addiction. But so do other factors, such as, environment. I have found very little of anything to support the Addictive personality theory.
However, I have MORE questions now. I am so very intrigued by the gender role and I would really like to see if I can find out more about how gender affects addiction. What about hormones? I also wonder what role gender and hormones play in recovery? I think this may help with my previous question of whether it is easier for some people to rehab than others. Is it easier for women to overcome addiction than men? I'm almost excited to research more!