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Summary
On the main page
Opiates and
love
Cocaine and
fight
Amphetamines
and flight
Nicotine and
food
Benzodiazepines
and sleep
Where in the
brain
Emotions
Decisioncenter
Pain
Learning
Reward
Behaviour
Training
Genes
Stress
Short term
effects
Long term
effects
Effects
between systems
Age and sex
Sources
Many did contribute to the analysis on this website. I like to
mention:
J. Olds, A. Wikler and C.R. Schuster; Sandra van Ginneken (who
collected the literature about the relation between sexuality and
heroin)
Especially Jan van Ree, professor psychofarmacology with
specialisations in addiction and opioids (Rudolf Magnusinstituut, Utrecht,
The Netherlands ).
The addicts and drugusers who told from their
experiences, for example in Gerben Hellinga and Hans Plomp Uit je
bol.
Researchers of the most important centers in the Netherlands
for the neurobiological drugresearch:
- Rudolf Magnusinstituut
(Utrecht): Jan van Ree, Mirjam Gerrits, professor Berry Spruyt, Louk
Vanderschuren and Gerrit Wolterink (now RIVM)
- Radboud University
(Nijmegen): Elisabeth van der Kam, Bart Ellenbroek and professor Lex
Cools
- VU (Amsterdam): professor Ton Schoffelmeer and Taco de Vries.
Justification
My study An explanatory model for opiate addiction gives sufficient
material for the link between opiates and propagation. Too many elements in
the opiate addiction are too specific to apply them to other main systems.
That is why other addictions must have other neurobiological bases. All
data about the other substances I did collect fit in analyses of this
website. A documentation about the research of all the substances is
planned. Lorna Role did research on the specific relation between nicotin and food
A fenomenological approach forms the basis of this analysis. This means
that systematically is tried to bring together as many data from different
angles and to fit these in a model. I kept the rule that when
inconsistencies were found, the model was not (yet) good. The data come
from different disciplines and are confirmed in hypothesistested research.
Mostly I did confirmed the data by other research. In fact most of these
researchprojects were perfectly done. But, with a sensitive subject like
drugs one should be very carefull with generalisations and use of the
concepts and the elucidations. Many people look only at the predispositions in individuals to get hooked (the medical approach), not asking the question
what mechanisms in the brain make people get hooked (the approach of researchers of the brain).
Besides of thorough research I also
fitted in data from manuels about addiction and common knowledge like the
fact that we do sleep and eat. These data are so obvious that they are
quickly ignored. But it are data too. I don't think that one
hypothesistesting research can give proof about the question what
addiction is. Well is it possible to test a model: the best model is the
one with as many data as possible and without existence of inconsistent
data, consistent and coherent.
About the author
Margreet Brandes (drs M. Brandes; born 1945): sociologist (RU Utrecht,
Holland)
Forthcoming from a study concerning the pros and cons of
giving heroin to heroinaddicts, started in 1976 my interest in the way
drugs en the brain work. The basis for the drugs-drives-analysis comes
from this period. I was intrigued by the then new knowledge, that the
brain makes its own drugs.This raised the questions, with which purpose
the brain makes these substances and how one can influence these
processes. Still unresolved questions.
My main reports and
activities on this subject:
Supplying heroin and methadone to addicts,
SWOAD, 1977
An explanatory model for opiate addiction,
1978/2000
Moderator session ENmeeting Doorwerth 2000 Sensitization
and natural reward mechanisms in addiction(s)
Moderator session
ENPmeeting Doorwerth 2006 Specific coupling of addictive drugs and
drivesystems
About the
author
Sources of
inspiration
Justification
Method
Contact