A recent study published in the Journal of Neuroscience found how a rat brain triggers and suppresses impulsive behavior. Canadian researchers hope that this will lead to new methods for diagnosing and treating addiction in humans.
How the brain deals with impulse control, or poor impulse control, is known to be involved in a number of complex mental health problems including addiction. In order to understand how the brain mediates impulsive behavior, the researchers examined the synaptic changes in the brains of rats that were trained to control their impulsive response to a given signal.
The research found that behavioral training was effective with impulsive response in the rats, and showed changes in the prefrontal cortex of the brain. The research further suggests neuronal involvement behind impulsiveness that maybe be amenable to new therapies.
“A clear-cut case of an addiction is choosing the pleasure of the immediate sensation of the drug over the long-term damage and problems that it causes,” said Scott Hayton, a doctoral candidate in neuroscience at Queen’s University in Ontario and lead author of the study.
Understanding the neurological mechanism behind such impulses may aid in the development of new drugs to inhibit them, he concluded.
The findings were published in the August 25 2011 issue of the Journal of Neuroscience.
