title: A general method for evaluating incubation of sucrose craving in rats.
abstract: For someone on a food-restricted diet, food craving in response to food-paired cues may serve as a key behavioral transition point between abstinence and relapse to food taking. Food craving conceptualized in this way is akin to drug craving in response to drug-paired cues. A rich literature has been developed around understanding the behavioral and neurobiological determinants of drug craving; we and others have been focusing recently on translating techniques from basic addiction research to better understand addiction-like behaviors related to food. As done in previous studies of drug craving, we examine sucrose craving behavior by utilizing a rat model of relapse. In this model, rats self-administer either drug or food in sessions over several days. In a session, lever responding delivers the reward along with a tone+light stimulus. Craving behavior is then operationally defined as responding in a subsequent session where the reward is not available. Rats will reliably respond for the tone+light stimulus, likely due to its acquired conditioned reinforcing properties. This behavior is sometimes referred to as sucrose seeking or cue reactivity. In the present discussion we will use the term "sucrose craving" to subsume both of these constructs. In the past decade, we have focused on how the length of time following reward self-administration influences reward craving. Interestingly, rats increase responding for the reward-paired cue over the course of several weeks of a period of forced-abstinence. This "incubation of craving" is observed in rats that have self-administered either food or drugs of abuse. This time-dependent increase in craving we have identified in the animal model may have great potential relevance to human drug and food addiction behaviors. Here we present a protocol for assessing incubation of sucrose craving in rats. Variants of the procedure will be indicated where craving is assessed as responding for a discrete sucrose-paired cue following extinction of lever pressing within the sucrose self-administration context (Extinction without cues) or as responding for sucrose-paired cues in a general extinction context (Extinction with cues).
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology and Program in Behavioral Neuroscience, Western Washington University, USA. jeff.grimm@wwu.edu
authors.forename: Jeffrey W
authors.initials: JW
authors.lastname: Grimm
authors.forename: Jesse
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Barnes
authors.forename: Kindsey
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: North
authors.forename: Stefan
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Collins
authors.forename: Rachel
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Weber
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001245:Association Learning; D016739:Behavior, Addictive; D001522:Behavior, Animal; D003214:Conditioning, Classical; D005247:Feeding Behavior; D005518:Food Preferences; D008297:Male; D023421:Models, Animal; D051381:Rats; D020318:Rats, Long-Evans; D013395:Sucrose / Q000008:administration & dosage*
chemical_list: D013395:Sucrose
references.citation: Physiol Behav. 2005 Jan 31;84(1):73-9
references.pmid: 15642609
references.citation: Behav Neurosci. 1992 Apr;106(2):274-85
references.pmid: 1590953
references.citation: Arch Gen Psychiatry. 2011 Aug;68(8):808-16
references.pmid: 21464344
references.citation: J Vis Exp. 2011 Jan 06;(47):
references.pmid: 21248699
references.citation: Psychopharmacology (Berl). 1993;112(2-3):163-82
references.pmid: 7871016
references.citation: Psychopharmacology (Berl). 2006 Nov;189(1):1-16
references.pmid: 17019567
references.citation: Eur J Pharmacol. 2005 Dec 5;526(1-3):36-50
references.pmid: 16289451
references.citation: J Neurosci. 2007 Nov 14;27(46):12655-63
references.pmid: 18003845
references.citation: Am J Psychiatry. 1999 Jan;156(1):11-8
references.pmid: 9892292
references.citation: Behav Pharmacol. 2008 Dec;19(8):777-85
references.pmid: 19020412
references.citation: Curr Opin Neurobiol. 1999 Apr;9(2):195-202
references.pmid: 10322181
references.citation: Neuroscience. 2009 Apr 10;159(4):1193-9
references.pmid: 19409204
references.citation: Psychopharmacology (Berl). 2003 Jul;168(1-2):3-20
references.pmid: 12402102
references.citation: Appetite. 2005 Jun;44(3):253-61
references.pmid: 15876472
references.citation: Psychopharmacology (Berl). 2011 Jul;216(2):219-33
references.pmid: 21318562