天然奖赏与药物奖赏

动物和人的中枢神经系统具有奖赏机制来加强和激励对机体有益的行为,以利个体生存和种族繁衍。但这一系统一旦被某些外源性物质反复地异常激活(如药物滥用),则引起神经系统的慢性适应性改变,将对机体造成严重损害。实现奖赏效应的神经结构主要位于中脑边缘系统,中脑腹侧被盖区(VTA)至伏核(NAc)的多巴胺通路是食物和性活动等天然奖赏和成瘾性药物引起奖赏效应的共同通路。本文概述天然奖赏和成瘾性药物奖赏的异同,旨在探讨阻断后者而不损及前者的途径。

Natural rewarding and drug rewarding

In the brain of animals and humans there is a rewarding mechanism to encourage the behavior that is beneficial for the living of the individual and for the prolongation of the generation. However, when this system is being abused by drugs of addiction, chronic adaptive changes may occur that would cause serious damage to the organism. The neural substrate of the rewarding system is mainly based on the dopaminergic pathway, starting from the ventral tegmental area of the midbrain and ended in the nucleus accumbens of the limbic brain. This pathway serves both natural rewarding such as food and sex as well as drug rewarding such as heroin and cocaine. This paper is aimed to discuss the similarities and differences between the natural and drug-induced rewarding in an attempt to block the latter without affecting the former.