Work independently on these items. Feel free to ask me about an item that you have a question about. Each item is worth an equal number of points. Turn in the examinations by 26 October 1998. I retain the option of adding an item should an interesting possibility arise. Enjoy!

1. Name a drug that acts (directly or indirectly) as an agonist and one that acts as an antagonist at each of the following receptors. State the generic name and a proprietary name where available. the half-life of elimination (if known) and how long it would take for 93.75% of the drug to be eliminated. Name two important clinical effects and two important "side effects":
1. Dopamine
2. GABA Chloride ionophore.
3. Glutamate
4. Serotonin
2. Compare and contrast subjective and discriminative effects of drugs. Do so conceptually, empirically, and methodologically
3. Describe how a drug can participate in respondent conditioning. Include a discussion of control conditions required show clearly that respondent conditioning has occurred

1. Mechanisms
1. Identify two ways of influencing drug self-administration behaviorally. Support your answers with results from the literature and describe treatment implications. What form of reductionism would Marr call this?
2. Identify two ways of influencing drug self-administration pharmacologically. Support your answers with results from the literature and describe treatment implications. What form of reductionism would Marr call this?

 

1. This item is based on Figure 1 of Carroll, Carmona, and May (1991) in your course packet. Make and analyze a demand curve and a response-output function for the data in the top left panel of Figure 1 (p 365). Use the following estimates of PCP deliveries with water and with saccharine shown in the table below. Follow the steps below.
1. Check my numbers. One is incorrect, determine which one and fill in the correct answer.
2. Make a table structured as below showing the important data (I've started it for you). The information required to do this is contained in the paper, mostly in the methods section. Describe how you obtained the values for each column.

1. Make a properly labeled demand curve by hand, on 3-cycle log paper, using the correct scaling on the axes. Estimate the point at which the slope is -1. Show and write the value on the horizontal axis corresponding to this point.
2. Make a properly labeled response-output curve by hand, on 3-cycle log paper. Show and write the value on the horizontal axis at which the curve peaks.
3. Summarize in a paragraph what this curve tells you about PCP intake. Be concrete and specific.
1. Describe how a second-order schedule could be used to determine whether stimuli paired with drug-delivery become conditional reinforcers. Be explicit about control procedures, experimental manipulations, and alternative explanations.
2. Ian Stolerman wrote: "Previously [drug addiction] was defined primarily by drug withdrawal syndromes and it was assumed, simply, that adaptive responses to the prolonged exposure of neurons to addictive drugs would provide the major neuropharmacological correlates of addiction. . . .. This perception of the nature of the problem was fundamentally inadequate and it was largely abandoned following the recognition that conditioning and learning processes were of central importance in addiction." (Stolerman, I. (1992) Drugs of abuse: behavioral principles, methods, and terms. Trends in Pharmacological Sciences. 13, 170-176.
1. Agree or disagree with this statement in an argument that refers appropriately to the primary literature.
2. Summarize the conditioning and learning processes involved.
3. Describe how the stimulus properties of a drug can be used to examine the pharmacological mechanism by which a drug acts. The answer should include some general considerations and an example using a drug of your choice (morphine, cocaine, caffeine, ethanol, LSD, . . .) as an example.
4. What does it mean to say that a drug can produce a stimulus around which an equivalence class can form? How was this determined experimentally? Discuss implications (if any) for prevention or treatment of human drug abuse.
5. Compare a drug as a stimulus with two physical stimuli (e.g., touch, light, sound, chemical stimuli). Identify similarities and differences. Do so at the level of behavior and at the level of the mechanism of "transduction."
6. Describe the demand equation.
1. Graph it using properly labeled axes.
2. Describe each term, how each term might be influenced, and show how they appear on the graph.
3. Show how equation 2 describing P_max in Hursh and Winger arises from the conditions producing P_max.
4. Summarize in a paragraph or two English, Rowlett, and Woolverton's (1995) critique of the demand equation shown above.
7. Conditioned compensatory responses and conditioned sensitization.
1. Describe the procedure used to identify these two effects of the drugs. Describe (where possible) the methods and the results that distinguish these two effects.
2. Define tolerance and describe why one of these is called "tolerance." Which one is it?
3. Pick a drug and critically evaluate whether that drug produces a conditioned compensatory response. You will have to go to the library and identify some primary literature for this one.

Send mail to newlamc@auburn.edu with questions or comments about this web site.
Last modified: July 10, 2002