What is the "Rat Park" experiment that considered the cause of drug poisoning to be in the living environment?

ByThomas Hawk

It is a common opinion that drugs such as narcotics and stimulants are toxic and it is because the cause is dependent on the drug ingredients, but it is a general view that denies this view "Rat Park"There is an experiment called. Researchers at the rat park experiments assume that the cause of drug poisoning is external factors, that is, the living environment in which drug dependents are placed.

It's not the morphine, it's the size of the cage: Rat Park experiment upturns conventional wisdom about addiction - garry's subposthaven
http://sub.garrytan.com/its-not-the-morphine-its-the-size-of-the-cage-rat-park-experiment-upturns-conventional-wisdom-about-addiction

Rat Park - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rat_Park

Rat Park drug experiment cartoon - Stuart McMillen comics
http://www.stuartmcmillen.com/comics_en/rat-park/

Professor Abram Goldstein of Stanford University in the 1960s pursued the cause of drug dependence from experiments using rats. Dr. Goldstein, who concluded from the experimental results that drug poisoning is caused by the ingredients of the drug itself, said, "Although rats with heroin poisoning are opposing society (like many drug addicts), they are sacrificing socioeconomic situation Even a person is neither a product of a family collapse nor a criminal.The behavior of a mouse is only controlled by the drug ingredients in the brain. " This opinion of Dr. Goldstein was widely known to society and became a general view.

However, there were researchers skeptical of this conclusion. Dr. Bruce Alegsander, a researcher at Simon Fraser University, focused on the fact that experiments are conducted by confining the mouse in a narrow cage, and research on conventional drug dependence focuses on the degree of influence placed in a different living environment We are doubtful about the experimental results as not being taken into consideration. And in 1980, Dr. Alexander said "Drug poisoning is caused by an external factor (living environment)In order to demonstrate this hypothesis, we will conduct an experiment called "Rat Park".

The rat park experiment gives the cage named "colony" of wire mesh of 18 × 25 × 18 cm reproducing the conventional narrow and solitary environment and about 200 times the size of a normal cage of 8.8 square meters A rat park was prepared, and a mouse was placed in each environment and a comparative experiment was carried out. The walls of the rat park draw pictures of the meadow where the rat lives normally, and on the ground spread the wood chips of evergreens easy to make nests, prepare boxes and cans that can further hide and play the rats, and the mice touch each other By providing an environment that allows mating and raising children, it realized "paradise" of rats as it is.



Dr. Alexander discovered that mice like sweet sugar water and hate bitter water, added sugar to bitter morphine water, changed the ratio of morphine to sugar one day a day, while the rats entered morphine We measured the number of days it took to become able to drink sugar water. As a result of the experiment, it became clear that colony rats began drinking morphine sugar water earlier than paradise rat. In addition, when comparing the total amount, it turned out that colonized rats drank 19 times more morphine sugar water than paradise rats.

Also, while colonized rats who had been forced to come into contact with other rats showed a drunk reaction to morphine, while rats enjoying paradise at rat park, playing with other rats, fiddling, mating Often do not drink too much morphine sugar water as if refusing to disturb pleasant life by morphine.

Dr. Alexander is also experimenting on withdrawal symptoms by morphine. For mice newly introduced to colonies and paradise, although it is possible to give morphine sugar water for most days mostly, it was given a day to select regular water and morphine water occasionally. Comparing the drinks selected by the rat on the selectable day, lonely colony rats continued to select morphine water, while paradise rats selected regular water to reduce the intake of morphine water It was. Although mice placed in different environments both showed morbine withdrawal symptoms, it turned out that there is a difference in the action taken there.

In addition, Dr. Alexander also obtained the experimental result that colonial rats given morphine for 57 consecutive days were transferred to rat parks and given the choice of normal water and morphine water, they would choose ordinary water I will.

From such a series of rat park experiments, Professor Alexander is convinced that his hypothesis that drug addiction is caused by an external factor (living environment) is correct.

ByAshley rose,

However, as the financial support from the university was terminated in 1982, the rat park experiment celebrated. Dr. Alexander, who continued his research on the causes of drug dependence even after that, said that his opinion is concerned about being blinded without any doubts as with the general view generated in the 1960s I will.

If Dr. Alexander's view that the mechanism causing drug addiction is "addiction, but the difference is only whether the surrounding world looks like a cage with a hard cage or a rat park" is correct, the drug prevention law It may be necessary to review the cure of drug dependents.