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Brain in Progress: Why Teens Can’t Always Resist Temptation

January 2015
The changes in the brain common to obesity and drug addiction are especially pertinent to the struggles teens face to resist drugs, because adolescence is a crucial period both of susceptibility to the rewards of drugs and of vulnerability to the long-term effects of drug exposure Read More.

5 Comments

Good News from Monitoring the Future 2014

December 2014
At the end of a year that has seen further tragic deaths from addiction and new designer drugs that put young people at risk, today's results from the 2014 Monitoring the Future (MTF) survey of drug use among adolescents provide a dose of welcome optimism. Read More.

1 Comment

Image of brain scans of control and Obese subjects showing reduced DA D2 receptor activity from control

Reproducibility Issues May Be Science’s Growing Pains

November 2014
I have written before about the reproducibility crisis in the health sciences. High percentages of published findings are failing to be reproduced, and this has prompted NIH Institutes and other funding agencies, as well as scientific journals and universities, to take measures to improve how science is taught, funded, conducted, and published. Read More.

2 Comments

Illustration of a billboard with a question mark in it

Marijuana Advertising and the Power of Conditioning

October 2014
As social acceptance and public policy around marijuana shift, and especially if legalized recreational use becomes more widespread, we will need to consider the influence and potential regulation of its marketing. Read More.

12 Comments

Opioids and Chronic Pain—A Gap in Our Knowledge

September 2014
Opioid prescriptions have increased three-fold over the past two decades, and we have seen how this skyrocketing availability of medications has helped create a new drug abusing population, some of whom suffer severe health consequences Read More.

8 Comments

Graph showing increased use of drugs in most categories by American Indian/Alaskan Native students - see text

Substance Use in American Indian Youth is Worse than We Thought

September 2014
We have long known that American Indian communities are particularly vulnerable to problems with substance use, which are tied in part to limited socioeconomic opportunity. But because national surveys fail to fully capture drug use patterns on or near reservations, the true scope of the problem has been elusive. Read More.

3 Comments

Science Should Guide Marijuana Policy

August 2014
In a series of recent articles, The New York Times’ editors presented a case for repealing the federal ban on marijuana, including the disproportionate impact of current marijuana laws on minorities. While there is no question that we should rectify any injustices associated with such policies, we also need to consider and prepare for the escalation in social and health costs that could result from creating a third legal drug in this country. We should be thoughtfully examining all policy and regulatory options available to minimize harms to society and promote Americans’ safety, well-being, and competitiveness Read More.

11 Comments

Seeking Input from the Research Community on the Upcoming Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Substance Use

July 2014
As we wrote in early May, the time is ripe for a large prospective cohort study that will comprehensively assess the effects of adolescent substance use on the developing brain. Read More.

6 Comments

National HIV Testing Day, June 27, 2014

June 2014
Almost 1.1 million Americans are currently living with the HIV virus, and nearly a sixth of those don’t even know they are infected. That means they aren’t getting needed treatment, and it means they could be passing the infection on to others without knowing. Read More.

0 Comments

Trends in overdose deaths 1999-2011, of significance from 2006 to 2011, opiod deaths up 28%, cocaine deaths down 35%, heroin deaths up 119%

What Can We Do About the Heroin Overdose Epidemic?

June 2014
A striking new dimension of our nation’s ongoing opioid epidemic is the escalating number of deaths from heroin overdose. Read More.

24 Comments

Dr. Nora Volkow: Remarks and Video Highlights

Dr. Nora Volkow on Addiction: A Disease of Free Will, May 2015
Watch video (21:11)
TEDMED, January 2015
Why do our brains get addicted?
Watch video (16:23)
The World Science Festival, April 2014
The Moth: The Brain's Addiction - Nora Volkow
Watch video (17:01)
CBS 60 Minutes, April 2012
Hooked: Why Bad Habits Are Hard to Break
Watch video (13:31)

About This Blog

Here I highlight important work being done at NIDA and other news related to the science of drug use and addiction.
—Dr. Nora Volkow, Director

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