Week 8 Lecture

Question 1

What is psychopharmacology?

Answer 1

The study of drug induced changes in mood, thinking and behaviour

Question 2

Where is the work pharmacology derived from?

Answer 2

the greek word Pharmakon, which means ‘drug’.

Question 3

What is a drug?

Answer 3

exogenous (external) chemical not necessary for normal cellular functioning which alters the activity of certain cells of the body.

Question 4

What are drugs that alter mood separated into?

Answer 4

stimulants, depressants, or hallucinogen

Question 5

What are anxiolytics?

Answer 5

Drugs used to reduce anxious feelings

Question 6

What are antidepressant drugs?

Answer 6

alleviate negative feelings typical of depressive symptoms

Question 7

What are antipsychotic drugs?

Answer 7

Used to treat severe forms of psychotic behaviour, such as hallucinations and delusions

Question 8

What do we define psychopharmacology as today?

Answer 8

the study of the effects of drugs on the nervous system and on behaviour

Question 9

Where did psychopharmacology originate?

Answer 9

In the early 19th century with recreational and organis drugs as medicines

Question 10

In the early 19th century, which drugs were freely accessible?

Answer 10

tea, opium, coffee, alcohol

Question 11

In the later part of the 19th century, which drugs were synthesise to be used for mental health?

Answer 11

morphine and chloral hydrate

Question 12

When was the first antipsychotic drugs developed and what was it?

Answer 12

chlorpromazine, and in the 1950’s.

Question 13

What is pharmacokinetics?

Answer 13

The process by which drugs are absorbed, distributed in the body, metabolised and excreted.

Question 14

What is drug effectiveness?

Answer 14

Relates to the ability of a drug to readily produce certain physiological and behavioural effects

Question 15

What are the effects of repeated administration?

Answer 15

tolerance and sensitisation

Question 16

Define placebo effects?

Answer 16

an inert substance is given to an organism in lieu of a physiologically active drug

Question 17

What does drug absorption refer to?

Answer 17

the mechanisms by which drugs get into the blood stream and distributed throughout the body

Question 18

In psychopharmacology, what are we particularly interested in?

Answer 18

how a drug gets into the brain, and how much (i.e how easily is passes from blood to neural tissues)

Question 19

How does a drug typically get into the central nervous system?

Answer 19

typically, through the blood stream

Question 20

What are some routes of administration?

Answer 20

-oral
-nasal
-inhalation
-rectal
etc

Question 21

What is the blood brain barrier for?

Answer 21

only for water soluble molecules

Question 22

Molecules that are soluble in lipids (fats) and not water have what effect on the blood brain barrier?

Answer 22

Pass through with ease.

Question 23

What is one way that drugs can cross the blood brain barrier to do with the water soluble molecules?

Answer 23

1. Passive movement of water soluble agents across the BBB is negligible because of the tight junctions between endothelial cells

Question 24

What is one way that drugs can cross the blood brain barrier to do with the lipids?

Answer 24

1. small, lipid soluble agents such as antidepressants cross the BBB via diffusion through endothelial cells

Question 25

What is the best way to measure the effectiveness of a drug?

Answer 25

To plot a dose response curve

Question 26

What does asymptote mean in relation to the drug response curve?

Answer 26

The greatest effect of the drug?

Question 27

What happens to the effects of a drug if it is administered repeatedly?

Answer 27

Its effects will not remain constant

Question 28

What is tolerance in regard to drug effects?

Answer 28

A decrease in the effectiveness of a drug that is administered repeatedly

Question 29

What is sensitisation?

Answer 29

An increase in the effectiveness of a drug that is administered repeatedly.

Question 30

What is contingent drug tolerance?

Answer 30

tolerance develops only to drug effects that are actually experienced contingent to a given behaviour.

Question 31

What is conditioned drug tolerance?

Answer 31

refers to where tolerance effects are maximally expressed only when a drug is administered in the same situation in which it has been administered.

Question 32

Because there are withdrawal effects frequently opposite to the initial effects of the drug, what does this suggest in regard to withdrawal effects?

Answer 32

They may be connected at a biological level with the changes that produce drug tolerance.

Question 33

What are long term effects of opioid withdrawls?

Answer 33

diarrhoea, dilated pupils, vomiting

Question 34

Where does the word placebo come from?

Answer 34

the Latin word placere, meaning "pleasure" or "to please".

Question 35

Are there neurological effects of a placebo?

Answer 35

yes

Question 36

What is an antagonist drug?

Answer 36

a drug that opposes or inhibits the effects of a particular neurotransmitter on the post synaptic cell

Question 37

What is an agonist drug?

Answer 37

a drug that facilitates the effects of a particular neurotransmitter on the postsynaptic cell.

Question 38

Who discovered the first neurotransmitter and when?

Answer 38

Otto Loewi in the 1920's

Question 39

About how many substances have been identified as neurotransmitters?

Answer 39

About 50

Question 40

What are neuromodulators?

Answer 40

Modulate the effects of neurotransmitter but they themselves are not neurotransmitter

Question 41

What are the key properties which qualify something to be a neurotransmitter? (4)

Answer 41

1. stored in the neuron 2. released into the synapse 3. causes an effect 4. degradation and reuptake

Question 42

What was the first neurotransmitter ever discovered?

Answer 42

acetlycholine

Question 43

What is acetylcholine primarily involved in?

Answer 43

motor movement

Question 44

Spiders use toxins to intefer with acetylcholine to do what?

Answer 44

produce paralysis

Question 45

What is acetylcholine's role in memory?

Answer 45

alzheimer's disease involves a degradation in acetylcholine neurons

Question 46

What are the 2 receptors that acetlycholine interacts with?

Answer 46

nicotine | muscarine

Question 47

What are biogenic amines?

Answer 47

important neurotransmitter in the brain

Question 48

What are the 5 established biogenic amine neurotransmitters?

Answer 48

1. norepinephrine 2. epinephrine 3. dopamine 4. histamine 5. serotonin they are all catecholamines

Question 49

What is norepinephrine?

Answer 49

distributed throughout central and peripheral nervous systems

Question 50

What is norepinephrine primarily responsible for?

Answer 50

maintaining cortical arousal | regulating organs

Question 51

What is norepinephrine involved in controlling? (3)

Answer 51

attention emotion eating

Question 52

adrenaline and noradrenaline interact with:

Answer 52

both alpha and beta

Question 53

What are norepinephrine activity linked to?

Answer 53

depression | attention deficit disorders

Question 54

Where is dopamine located?

Answer 54

forebrain pathways which originate in the brain stem

Question 55

Deficiencies in dopamine in the nigrostriatal pathway results in what?

Answer 55

Parkinson's disease

Question 56

Dopamine is heavily involved in what pathway?

Answer 56

the reward pathway

Question 57

What are the 2 different family of dopamine?

Answer 57

D1 like receptor family | D2 like receptor family

Question 58

What is serotonin distributed throuout?

Answer 58

brain and spinal chord

Question 59

What is serotonin involved in the control of? (4)

Answer 59

sleep/wake cycle mood impulsive behaviour appetite

Question 60

What disorders have serotonin been involved in? (5)

Answer 60

``` sleep disorders aggression obesity anorexia depression ```

Question 61

Serotonin drugs are important for the treatment in what?

Answer 61

depression

Question 62

What are 4 forms of serotonin drugs to block reuptake and help depression?

Answer 62

prozac zoloft luvox paxil

Question 63

What are amino acid transmitters?

Answer 63

provides most of excitatory and inhibitory neurotransmission in the nervous system.

Question 64

What are 2 main amino acid transmitters?

Answer 64

glutamate (excitatory) | GABA (inhibitory)

Question 65

What are the 2 main categories of glutamate receptors?

Answer 65

ionotropic | metabotropic

Question 66

What is the elevated plus maze?

Answer 66

a rodent model of anxiety

Question 67

dopamine release is observed where?

Answer 67

in the nucleus accumbens

Question 68

What has an indirect, modulatory effect on the brain, potentiating the actions of GABA?

Answer 68

ethanol (alcohol)

Question 69

Nicotine activates what? (2)

Answer 69

1. nicotinic acetylcholine receptors in the VTA region, increasing dopamine cell firing 2. opioid peptide release

Question 70

What do cannabinoids reinforce the effects of?

Answer 70

tetrahydrocannabinol

Question 71

the acute reinforcing effects of THC involve the activation of what?

Answer 71

dopamine system

Question 72

MDMA (ecstasy) enhances what?

Answer 72

empathy and close relations

Question 73

What properties does MDMA have?

Answer 73

stimulant and hallucinogenic properties