About this Research Topic
Drugs (e.g. alcohol, stimulants, opiates and cannabis) can be used to manage emotions. They can reduce or smother negative emotions and produce or amplify positive ones. For example, people sometimes drink alcohol to calm down when stressed and other times people drink to enhance the enjoyment of a happy occasion.
From the neurobiological perspective, there is evidence that young people with a high risk of addiction have dopamine systems that are hypersensitive to emotionally salient stimuli, such as stress and the subjective effects of drugs. Stress is also a well-known factor in vulnerability to relapse. Addiction therapists often tell their clients that they use drugs to change emotions. A reasonable argument can also be made that many therapeutic treatments, including 12-step abstinence programs, work by helping addicts in recovery more effectively manage their emotions and stress.
This Research Topic aims to explore the role of emotions and stress in the etiology of addiction and relapse. One hypothesis is that an over-responsive dopamine system lies at the heart of addiction. Initially, the system’s hypersensitivity to emotions makes drugs attractive to young people as a means to produce and enhance positive and reduce negative affect. Then, through repeated drug use, the system over-reacts to the drugs and their associated cues and addiction results. While the hypothesis is reasonable, evidence for it is mixed. The questions remain:
• How close to the truth is it?
• What more might there be to the story?
• What other brain and behavioral systems are involved?
The scope of this Research Topic is therefore, broadly speaking, the crosstalk between addiction and emotion. Original research, review, and philosophical articles would be welcome.
Specific themes may include, but are not limited to the following:
• Causal relations among emotions, stress and behavior in humans and animals with and without propensity to addiction;
• Causal relations among emotions, stress and behavior in humans and animals in active addiction and in recovery from addiction;
• The effects of emotion and stress on addiction-related neurobiological systems;
• The role of emotion management in successful recovery programs.
From the neurobiological perspective, there is evidence that young people with a high risk of addiction have dopamine systems that are hypersensitive to emotionally salient stimuli, such as stress and the subjective effects of drugs. Stress is also a well-known factor in vulnerability to relapse. Addiction therapists often tell their clients that they use drugs to change emotions. A reasonable argument can also be made that many therapeutic treatments, including 12-step abstinence programs, work by helping addicts in recovery more effectively manage their emotions and stress.
This Research Topic aims to explore the role of emotions and stress in the etiology of addiction and relapse. One hypothesis is that an over-responsive dopamine system lies at the heart of addiction. Initially, the system’s hypersensitivity to emotions makes drugs attractive to young people as a means to produce and enhance positive and reduce negative affect. Then, through repeated drug use, the system over-reacts to the drugs and their associated cues and addiction results. While the hypothesis is reasonable, evidence for it is mixed. The questions remain:
• How close to the truth is it?
• What more might there be to the story?
• What other brain and behavioral systems are involved?
The scope of this Research Topic is therefore, broadly speaking, the crosstalk between addiction and emotion. Original research, review, and philosophical articles would be welcome.
Specific themes may include, but are not limited to the following:
• Causal relations among emotions, stress and behavior in humans and animals with and without propensity to addiction;
• Causal relations among emotions, stress and behavior in humans and animals in active addiction and in recovery from addiction;
• The effects of emotion and stress on addiction-related neurobiological systems;
• The role of emotion management in successful recovery programs.
Keywords: Addiction, Relapse, Stress, Dopamine, Recovery, Drugs, Emotion
Important Note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.
