It’s known environmental cues can be strong triggers for those trying to kick a drug habit because those cues activate the brain’s emotional and stimulus-response systems.
It’s known environmental cues can be strong triggers for those trying to kick a drug habit because those cues activate the brain’s emotional and stimulus-response systems.
A new study by University of Guelph researchers reveals for the first time that there’s more going on in the brain when someone walks past a customary lighting-up spot or sees drug-taking paraphernalia that makes quitting the habit even harder.
Besides triggering the brain’s emotional and stimulus-response systems (“see smoking area, smoke, feel good”), environmental cues activate brain areas where memories are processed.
Prompting these memory processing systems of the brain makes it extra difficult to counter addiction, said psychology professor and study co-author Francesco Leri.
Read more at University of Guelph
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