Skip to main content

Advertisement

Log in

Neural correlates of oxytocin and cue reactivity in cocaine-dependent men and women with and without childhood trauma

  • Original Investigation
  • Published:
Psychopharmacology Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Rationale

Women with cocaine use disorder have worse treatment outcomes compared with men. Sex differences in cocaine addiction may be driven by differences in neurobiology or stress reactivity. Oxytocin is a potential therapeutic for stress reduction in substance use disorders, but no studies have examined the effect of oxytocin on neural response to drug cues in individuals with cocaine use disorders or potential sex differences in this response.

Objectives

The goal of this study was to examine the effect of intranasal oxytocin on cocaine cue reactivity in cocaine dependence, modulated by gender and history of childhood trauma.

Methods

Cocaine-dependent men with (n = 24) or without (n = 19) a history of childhood trauma and cocaine-dependent women with (n = 16) or without (n = 8) a history of childhood trauma completed an fMRI cocaine cue reactivity task under intranasal placebo or oxytocin (40 IU) on two different days. fMRI response was measured in the right amygdala and dorsomedial prefrontal cortex (DMPFC).

Results

In the DMPFC, oxytocin reduced fMRI response to cocaine cues across all subject groups. However, in the amygdala, only men with a history of childhood trauma showed a significantly reduced fMRI response to cocaine cues on oxytocin versus placebo, while women with a history of childhood trauma showed an enhanced amygdala response to cocaine cues following oxytocin administration. Cocaine-dependent subjects with no history of childhood trauma showed no effect of oxytocin on amygdala response.

Conclusions

Oxytocin can reduce cue reactivity in cocaine dependence, but its effect is modified by sex and childhood trauma history. Whereas men with cocaine dependence may benefit from oxytocin administration, additional studies are needed to determine whether oxytocin can be an effective therapeutic for cocaine-dependent women.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3

Similar content being viewed by others

References

Download references

Acknowledgments

We thank Laura Lohnes for assistance with the fMRI data analysis.

Funding

This study was sponsored by a National Institute on Drug Abuse grants P50DA016511 (K. Brady), K23DA045099 (B. Sherman), and K24DA038240 (A. McRae-Clark), with additional support from the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences grant UL1TR001450 (K. Brady).

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Jane E. Joseph.

Ethics declarations

Written informed consent was obtained before study assessments were administered. All procedures were conducted in accordance with Good Clinical Practice Guidelines and the Declaration of Helsinki, and the protocol received Institutional Review Board (IRB) approval.

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Additional information

Publisher’s note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Joseph, J.E., McRae-Clark, A., Sherman, B.J. et al. Neural correlates of oxytocin and cue reactivity in cocaine-dependent men and women with and without childhood trauma. Psychopharmacology (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00213-019-05360-7

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00213-019-05360-7

Keywords

Navigation