Conservative talk-show host Rush Limbaugh, U.S. Rep. Patrick Kennedy and local sportscaster Keith Mills may be the names in the news asthe nation?s most recently exposed drug addicts.
But those cases are far from typical.
People with dominant, outgoing, successful personalities actually have brains wired in such a way that makes them less likely to enjoy drugs and become addicted to them, Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse at the National Institutes of Health, said in a lecture at the University of Maryland Medical School Teaching Facility in front of 300 people Wednesday.
Volkow, great-granddaughter of Bolshevik revolutionist Leon Trotsky, said genes are important in determining who becomes addicted to drugs and who doesn?t.
“Some genes may protect you,” she said. “Some may make you vulnerable.”
But genes can only take a person so far. Environment ? that is, the how much people are exposed to drugs ? is equally important.
In a study of monkeys, researchers found that animals with dominant personalities were less likely to be become addicted to cocaine than those monkeys with weaker dispositions, Volkow said.
However, even the monkeys with stronger personalities would become addicted to the drug if they were forced to take it repeatedly, she said.
“Even if you have protective factors, you can overcome them with enough exposure to the drug,” she said.
About 10 percent of people who take drugs will end up becoming “chronically addicted,” based on a combination of their genes and environment, but that?s a place no one tries to get to, Volkow said.
“Addiction is not something anyone tries to get into,” she said. “No one wants to be addicted.”
Volkow also discussed the differences between different drugs. Methamphetamine users are less likely to binge than cocaine users, Volkow said, because methamphetamines stay in high levels in the brain for longer periods of time, thereby reducing the urge to take the drug repeatedly in a short period of time.
“Cocaine users will binge for 24, 48 hours until they physically collapse or they don?t have any drug left,” she said.
Tony Tommasello, director of the Office of Substance Abuse Studies at the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy, said after the lecture that addicts like Limbaugh, Kennedy and Mills are atypical.
“Those are people who got hooked initially on prescription drugs,” he said. “They weren?t going out and looking for a high.”
