The acute effects of cannabidiol on the neural correlates of reward anticipation and feedback in healthy volunteers

Abstract

Background: Cannabidiol has potential therapeutic benefits for people with psychiatric disorders characterised by reward function impairment. There is existing evidence that cannabidiol may influence some aspects of reward processing. However, it is unknown whether cannabidiol acutely affects brain function underpinning reward anticipation and feedback. Hypotheses: We predicted that cannabidiol would augment brain activity associated with reward anticipation and feedback. Methods: We administered a single 600 mg oral dose of cannabidiol and matched placebo to 23 healthy participants in a double-blind, placebo-controlled, repeated-measures design. We employed the monetary incentive delay task during functional magnetic resonance imaging to assay the neural correlates of reward anticipation and feedback. We conducted whole brain analyses and region-of-interest analyses in pre-specified reward-related brain regions. Results: The monetary incentive delay task elicited expected brain activity during reward anticipation and feedback, including in the insula, caudate, nucleus accumbens, anterior cingulate and orbitofrontal cortex. However, across the whole brain, we did not find any evidence that cannabidiol altered reward-related brain activity. Moreover, our Bayesian analyses showed that activity in our regions-of-interest was similar following cannabidiol and placebo. Additionally, our behavioural measures of motivation for reward did not show a significant difference between cannabidiol and placebo. Discussion: Cannabidiol did not acutely affect the neural correlates of reward anticipation and feedback in healthy participants. Future research should explore the effects of cannabidiol on different components of reward processing, employ different doses and administration regimens, and test its reward-related effects in people with psychiatric disorders.

Individual and combined effects of Cannabidiol (CBD) and Δ9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) on striato-cortical connectivity in the human brain

“…Additional data from this study have been published elsewhere; these previous reports did not investigate resting-state striato-cortical connectivity (Bloomfield et al, 2020; Lawn et al, 2020).…”

“…CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 International license available under a (which was not certified by peer review) is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. It is made The copyright holder for this preprint this version posted November 21, 2020. ; https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.11.20.391805 doi: bioRxiv preprint 8 Additional data from this study have been published elsewhere; these previous reports did not investigate resting-state striato-cortical connectivity (Bloomfield et al, 2020;Lawn et al, 2020).…”

The angiotensin antagonist Losartan modulates social reward motivation and punishment sensitivity via modulating midbrain-striato-frontal circuits

“…The three different types of anticipation were modeled according to the cues signaling a potential social reward, social punishment, and neutral outcome. In line with previous studies the cue and subsequent delay were modelled as anticipation period (2,(60)(61)(62). In line with the potential response pattern of the participants five different types of outcome were modeled, including reward or neutral feedback in reward trial, punishment or neutral feedback in punishment trial, and neutral feedback in neutral trial.…”

A Mini-Review of Relationships Between Cannabis Use and Neural Foundations of Reward Processing, Inhibitory Control and Working Memory

“…In humans, however, CBD administered via capsules did not change reinforcing subjective effects of smoked cannabis (97). CBD administered acutely before participants performed a monetary incentive delay task showed no differences in neural activations between CBD and placebo for either reward anticipation or reward receipt (98). Data on CBD and reward processing is thus somewhat inconsistent regarding whether or not it impacts THC's or other substance's effects on reward processing.…”