Translational Research on Habit and Alcohol

Abstract

Habitual actions enable efficient daily living, but they can also contribute to pathological behaviors that resistant change, such as alcoholism. Habitual behaviors are learned actions that appear goal-directed but are in fact no longer under the control of the action’s outcome. Instead, these actions are triggered by stimuli, which may be exogenous or interoceptive, discrete or contextual. A major hallmark characteristic of alcoholism is continued alcohol use despite serious negative consequences. In essence, although the outcome of alcohol seeking and drinking is dramatically devalued, these actions persist, often triggered by environmental cues associated with alcohol use. Thus, alcoholism meets the definition of an initially goal-directed behavior that converts to a habit-based process. Habit and alcohol have been well investigated in rodent models, with comparatively less research in non-human primates and people. This review focuses on translational research on habit and alcohol with an emphasis on cross-species methodology and neural circuitry.

Adolescents' Reward‐related Neural Activation: Links to Thoughts of Nonsuicidal Self‐Injury

“…Furthermore, the putamen is particularly involved in the learning of stimulus–action–response associations and the preparation and execution of reward‐oriented motor movements (Haruno & Kawato, ). Perhaps because the putamen has been found to integrate information regarding the expectation of a reward with associated action tendencies, the putamen has also been linked to the transition from goal‐directed to habitual drug use behavior in animal models (McKim, Shnitko, Robinson, & Boettiger, ; Zapata, Minney, & Shippenberg, ). Thus, it is possible that the putamen may be involved in the transition from the consideration of self‐injury to actual engagement in NSSI behaviors and, thus, it may have been particularly sensitive to our measure of NSSI, which involved questions regarding one's actual intent to carry out future NSSI behaviors.…”

A paradigm for examining stress effects on alcohol‐motivated behaviors in participants with alcohol use disorder

“…These alcohol‐induced behavioral changes, which most likely result from alterations in neural circuitry, may contribute to a weakening of volitional control and a failure to abstain from alcohol. It has also been proposed that this switch is involved in the transition from casual to heavy, hazardous drinking (Barker & Taylor ; McKim et al ).…”

Evidence for a Long-Lasting Compulsive Alcohol Seeking Phenotype in Rats

“…Alcohol addiction is characterized both by the inability to control drinking and the emergence of alcohol seeking habits, which can be characterized as compulsive because the behavior persists despite adverse consequences (American Psychiatric Association, 2013;Corbit et al, 2012;Everitt and Robbins, 2015;Koob and Volkow, 2010;McKim et al, 2016). Although the few treatments currently available all aim to reduce alcohol intake, none have been designed to reduce the compulsive seeking of alcohol that leads to drinking at relapse.…”