Brains of addicts are inherently abnormal: study

[Selected by Rael]

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The Raelian Movement
for those who are not afraid of the future : http://www.rael.org
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http://news.yahoo.com/brains-addicts-inherently-abnormal-study-214826787.htm
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Brains of addicts are inherently abnormal: study
AFPAFP - Thu, Feb 2, 2012

Drug addicts have inherited abnormalities in some parts of the brain which
interfere with impulse control, said a British study published in the United
States on Thursday.

Previous research has pointed to these differences, but it was unclear if
they resulted from the ravages of addiction or if they were there beforehand
to predispose a person to drug abuse.

Scientists at the University of Cambridge compared the brains of addicts to
their non-addicted siblings as well as to healthy, unrelated volunteers and
found that the siblings shared many of the same weaknesses in their brains.

That indicates that the brain vulnerabilities had a family origin, though
somehow the siblings of addicts -- either due to environmental factors or
other differences in brain structure -- were able to resist addiction.

"Presumably, the siblings must have some other resilience factors that
counteract the familial vulnerability to drug dependence," said the study
led by Karen Ersche of the University of Cambridge, published in the journal
Science.

"An individual's predisposition to become addicted to stimulant drugs may be
mediated by brain abnormalities linked to impaired self-control."

Researchers tested 50 biological sibling pairs, in which one was addicted to
drugs and the other one had no history of chronic drug abuse. They also
tested 50 healthy, unrelated pairs of people as a control group.

The tests involved measuring how well they could control their impulses in a
stop-signal reaction time test that assesses how quickly a person can switch
from following one set of instructions to another.

Addicts are known to have poor impulse control.

The researchers found that the sibling pairs -- even the non-addicts --
fared significantly worse on the test than the healthy volunteers.

Brain scans showed that the siblings shared some of the same weaknesses in
the frontal lobe and its connections to the basal ganglia, which mediates
motor, cognition and behavior.

In an accompanying Perspective article, Nora Volkow and Ruben Baler of the
US National Institute on Drug Abuse said that knowing more about brain
circuitry could help understand and treat other "impaired control"
disorders, like obesity, pathological gambling, attention deficit
hyperactivity disorder, and obsessive-compulsive disorders.

"Several childhood and adolescent interventions can improve executive
function and self-control," though more study is needed to see how such work
may or may not impact the brain, they wrote.

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mean that I agree with their content or support it. "Selected by RAEL"
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in the past about stupid Christian fundamentalists in America praying
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believe that I was supporting praying to change the weather. So, when
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people (as only depressed and sad people use drugs) in prison and ruin
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any change to the Message which says clearly that we must not use any
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