Faculty Advisor
Dr. Lisa Baker
Department
Psychology
Presentation Date
4-14-2016
Document Type
Poster
Abstract
Experimental investigations into the behavioral and neurochemical effects of illicit β-ketophenethylamines (synthetic cathinones, “bath salts”) has increased in recent years. Two cathinone derivatives in particular, MDPV and mephedrone (4-MMC), have received a considerable amount of research attention given their relative popularity among users at the turn of the 21st century. Researchers investigating MDPV and 4-MMC have devoted much of their attention toward evaluating the drugs’ reinforcing efficacy, rewarding effects, receptor binding profiles, and effects on ambulatory responses.
There exist few published studies that have evaluated the discriminable stimulus effects of MDPV and 4-MMC using rodent drug discrimination procedures. To date, only two of these previous experiments included doses of MDPV or 4-MMC as the training drug (Fantegrossi et al., 2013; Varner et al., 2013).
The present study assessed the discriminable stimulus effects of MDPV or 4-MMC in male rats trained to discriminate 0.3 mg/kg MDPV or 1.0 mg/kg 4-MMC from saline. In this experiment, several prototypical drugs of abuse that produce effects on monoamine functioning were evaluated using stimulus generalization tests.
WMU ScholarWorks Citation
Berquist, Michael, "Evaluation of the Discriminable Stimulus Effects of 0.3 mg/kg 3, 4‑methylenedioxypyrovalerone (MDPV) and 1.0 mg/kg 4-methylmethcathinone (4-MMC) Using a Drug Discrimination Procedure in Male Sprague-Dawley Rats" (2016). Research and Creative Activities Poster Day. 185.
https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/grad_research_posters/185