Ville Oinio1,2, Mikko Sundström3, Pia Bäckström4, Johanna Uhari-Väänänen3,4, Kalervo Kiianmaa4, Atso Raasmaja3, Petteri Piepponen3. 1. Department of Pharmacology and Pharmacotherapy, Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Helsinki, P.O. Box 56, 00014, Helsinki, Finland. ville.oinio@helsinki.fi. 2. Department of Health, National Institute for Health and Welfare, P.O. Box 30, 00271, Helsinki, Finland. ville.oinio@helsinki.fi. 3. Department of Pharmacology and Pharmacotherapy, Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Helsinki, P.O. Box 56, 00014, Helsinki, Finland. 4. Department of Health, National Institute for Health and Welfare, P.O. Box 30, 00271, Helsinki, Finland.
Abstract
RATIONALE: Comorbidity with gambling disorder (GD) and alcohol use disorder (AUD) is well documented. OBJECTIVE: The purpose of our study was to examine the influence of genetic alcohol drinking tendency on reward-guided decision making behavior of rats and the impact of dopamine releaser D-amphetamine on this behavior. METHODS: In this study, Alko alcohol (AA) and Wistar rats went through long periods of operant lever pressing training where the task was to choose the profitable of two options. The lever choices were guided by different-sized sucrose rewards (one or three pellets), and the probability of gaining the larger reward was slowly changed to a level where choosing the smaller reward would be the most profitable in the long run. After training, rats were injected (s.c.) with dopamine releaser D-amphetamine (0.3, 1.0 mg/kg) to study the impact of rapid dopamine release on this learned decision making behavior. RESULTS: Administration of D-amphetamine promoted unprofitable decision making of AA rats more robustly when compared to Wistar rats. At the same time, D-amphetamine reduced lever pressing responses. Interestingly, we found that this reduction in lever pressing was significantly greater in Wistar rats than in AA rats and it was not linked to motivation to consume sucrose. CONCLUSIONS: Our results indicate that conditioning to the lever pressing in uncertain environments is more pronounced in AA than in Wistar rats and indicate that the reinforcing effects of a gambling-like environment act as a stronger conditioning factor for rats that exhibit a genetic tendency for high alcohol drinking.
RATIONALE: Comorbidity with gambling disorder (GD) and alcohol use disorder (AUD) is well documented. OBJECTIVE: The purpose of our study was to examine the influence of genetic alcohol drinking tendency on reward-guided decision making behavior of rats and the impact of dopamine releaser D-amphetamine on this behavior. METHODS: In this study, Alko alcohol (AA) and Wistar rats went through long periods of operant lever pressing training where the task was to choose the profitable of two options. The lever choices were guided by different-sized sucrose rewards (one or three pellets), and the probability of gaining the larger reward was slowly changed to a level where choosing the smaller reward would be the most profitable in the long run. After training, rats were injected (s.c.) with dopamine releaser D-amphetamine (0.3, 1.0 mg/kg) to study the impact of rapid dopamine release on this learned decision making behavior. RESULTS: Administration of D-amphetamine promoted unprofitable decision making of AA rats more robustly when compared to Wistar rats. At the same time, D-amphetamine reduced lever pressing responses. Interestingly, we found that this reduction in lever pressing was significantly greater in Wistar rats than in AA rats and it was not linked to motivation to consume sucrose. CONCLUSIONS: Our results indicate that conditioning to the lever pressing in uncertain environments is more pronounced in AA than in Wistar rats and indicate that the reinforcing effects of a gambling-like environment act as a stronger conditioning factor for rats that exhibit a genetic tendency for high alcohol drinking.
Entities:
Keywords:
Alcohol use disorder; D-Amphetamine; Decision making; Gambling; Rats
Authors: Juho Joutsa; Jarkko Johansson; Solja Niemelä; Antti Ollikainen; Mika M Hirvonen; Petteri Piepponen; Eveliina Arponen; Hannu Alho; Valerie Voon; Juha O Rinne; Jarmo Hietala; Valtteri Kaasinen Journal: Neuroimage Date: 2012-02-14 Impact factor: 6.556