drugs+and+the+brain

So you wanted to know about psychoactive drugs and what exactly they do in the brain.

Well, the answer is based on: 1. What type of drug? 2. How much of the drug got into the brain? Depending on the mechanism -swallowing a pill, smoking, snorting, injecting in a vein, dropping on the eyeball, varying amounts of psychoactive agents are going to be able to reach the brain.

**Addiction:** the condition that results when a person ingests a substance (e.g., alcohol, [|cocaine] , [|nicotine] ) or engages in an activity (e.g., gambling, [|sex] , shopping) that can be pleasurable but the continued use/act of which becomes compulsive and interferes with ordinary life responsibilities, such as work, relationships, or [|health] . Users may not be aware that their behavior is out of control and causing problems for themselves and others. [|citation] Addiction is both chemical and emotional.
 * Terms to know:**

media type="youtube" key="HUngLgGRJpo" width="560" height="315" **Dependence:** When a body functions normally only with the presence of the drug in the body. Evidence of this is called withdrawal which can be mild for caffeine and life threatening for opioids. **Persistent psychosis:** Called "flashbacks" a catatonic state or psychosis is more scientific. Neural pathways, once established, are traveled. Psychoactive drugs can trigger short and long term psychotic behaviors. It is important to note that conditions like Bipolar disorder and Schizophrenia can have both genetic causes and environmental causes. The combination of environmental and and genetic causes is called **e** **pigenetics **.
 * Tolerance: **When a body needs more and more of the drug to get the same results. This can happen at the neurological level and/or the emotional level.

<span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #444444; font-family: Verdana,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.5;">Drugs which cause hallucinations—profound distortions in a person’s perceptions of reality can be found in some plants and mushrooms (or their extracts) or can be man-made, and are divided into two categories: classic hallucinogens (LSD) and dissociative drugs (PCP). When under the influence of either type of drug, people often report rapid, intense emotional swings and perceiving sensations that seem real to them but are not. [|Short term and long term effects] Despite LSD being one of the most studied psychoactive drugs on Earth, scientists still aren't totally sure how it stimulates the receptor sites for serotonin.
 * Hallucinogens:**

<span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">A study following 1600 Australian school-children, aged 14 to 15 for seven years, found that while children who use cannabis regularly have a significantly higher risk of depression, the opposite was not the case - children who already suffered from depression were not more likely than anyone else to use cannabis. However, adolescents who used cannabis daily were five times more likely to develop depression and anxiety in later life. [|source]
 * Marijuana**

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">There is now sufficient evidence to show that those who use cannabis particularly at a younger age, such as around the age of 15, have a higher than average risk of developing a psychotic illness, such as [|**schizophrenia**] or [|**bipolar disorder**]. These studies also show that the risk is dose-related. The more cannabis consumed, or the higher the THC content, the more likely they were to develop a psychotic illness. Furthermore, a study in Australia recently showed that those who used cannabis could develop the illness about 2.70 years earlier than those who did not.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">Before and during **synaptic pruning**, the adolescent brain is particularly vulnerable to changes. As you remember, synaptic pruning is during the teenage years when extra neural connections that aren't really needed are "pruned" away and only the most necessary connections remain. This is why the adult brain has fewer connections than a child, which is why children are more creative...and have a harder time problem-solving.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">It is also known that not everyone who uses cannabis, even at a young age, develops a psychotic illness. The available research shows that those who have a family history of a psychotic illness, or those who have certain characteristics such as [|**schizotypal personality**], or possibly have certain types of genes, may increase the risk of developing a psychotic illness following the regular use of strong cannabis. Again, this is called **epigenetics.**

What is known is that consuming THC at a young age will definitely impact the amygdala and hippocampus and impact the individual's emotions and short term memory making abilities in various ways that aren't really understood. [|link] This change in the architecture of the growing brain cannot be reversed, but again, the impact is based upon the amount of consumption.

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