Dysfunction of the prefrontal cortex in addiction: neuroimaging findings and clinical implications

By Rita Z. Goldstein, Nora D. Volkow. Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 2011

2,607 citations recorded by the source corpus.

The loss of control over drug intake that occurs in addiction was initially believed to result from disruption of subcortical reward circuits. However, imaging studies in addictive behaviours have identified a key involvement of the prefrontal cortex (PFC) both through its regulation of limbic reward regions and its involvement in higher-order executive function (for example, self-control, salience attribution and awareness). This Review focuses on functional neuroimaging studies conducted in the past decade that have expanded our understanding of the involvement of the PFC in drug addiction. Disruption of the PFC in addiction underlies not only compulsive drug taking but also accounts for the disadvantageous behaviours that are associated with addiction and the erosion of free will.

Subfields: Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience, Cognitive Neuroscience, Experimental and Cognitive Psychology

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/f2425f0eb2a41236fdf32c5ebfe7355aecb2b5b6

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Citations in the corpus

The Brain on Drugs: From Reward to Addiction. (2015, background): “…uncovers distinct contributions of PFC regions to addiction on the basis of their striatal projections: dlPFC and inferior frontal regions that project to the dorsal caudate facilitate self-control, whereas ventral PFC regions projecting to NAc facilitate drug taking (Goldstein and Volkow, 2011).”
Integrating psychological and neurobiological considerations regarding the development and maintenance of specific Internet-use disorders: An Interaction of Person-Affect-Cognition-Execution (I-PACE) model. (2016, positive): “…ther Internet-use disorders (e.g., Brand et al., 2016) may reflect maladaptive interaction of cue-reactivity/craving and reduced refrontal/executive functioning, as suggested for substance addicions (Goldstein and Volkow, 2011; Koob and Volkow, 2010; olkow and Fowler, 2000; Volkow et al., 2002).”
Neuroimaging cognitive reappraisal in clinical populations to define neural targets for enhancing emotion regulation. A systematic review (2016, background): “A reduced capacity for cognitive regulation of emotion is assumed to arise from both sensitized emotional/reward brain systems and weakened brain networks for cognitive control (Etkin and Wager, 2007; Goldstein and Volkow, 2011; Hamilton et al., 2012).”
DSM-5 Criteria for Substance Use Disorders: Recommendations and Rationale (2013, background): “, OPRM1 A118G and naltrexone response [124, 125]) Positron emission tomography (PET) imaging of brain functioning indicates that dopamine is associated with substance use (126, 127).”
The Association Between Internet Gaming Disorder and Impulsivity: A Systematic Review of Literature (2019, background): “Apart from the IFG, the medial frontal gyrus (MFG) is closely related with reward mechanisms and risky decision-making (Goldstein and Volkow 2011).”
Ethics of the Attention Economy: The Problem of Social Media Addiction (2020, background): “…propose specific molecular [e.g., the neurotransmitters dopamine and gamma-aminobutyric acid] and neurological [e.g., activity in the ventral tegmental area, the nucleus accumbens, and the prefrontal cortex] mechanisms of addiction; Fakhoury, 2014; Goldstein & Volkow, 2011; Koob & Simon, 2009).”