Available online 18 May 2022, 107635

Sign-tracking is a behavior seen in appetitive conditioned where the subject approaches a signal for reward.

Controlling sign-tracking may be important for patients rehabilitating from drug addiction.

Ketamine has been used to reducing sign-tracking but is a scheduled drug with barriers to use.

In this study, a similar drug, dextromethorphan was an effective reducer of sign-tracking, suggesting utility in the treatment of drug dependency.

Sign-tracking is a well-known phenomenon in appetitive Pavlovian conditioning in which subjects approach the site of a conditioned stimulus (CS) associated with an appetitive unconditioned stimulus (US) even when the two are located separately. Control of sign-tracking may be important in rehabilitation from drug dependence to help ward off relapse. Recent studies have found success in using ketamine to reduce sign-tracking. In this study, we employed a similar but unscheduled drug, dextromethorphan (DXM), which affects many of the same molecular targets as ketamine, in an attempt to reduce sign-tracking in a standard paradigm. DXM was found to reduce sign-tracking at the doses examined in this study, while goal-tracking (approaching the site of the US rather than CS) was relatively unaffected. DXM offers advantages over ketamine in terms of use with patients and may have some utility in rehabilitation.

sign-tracking

goal-tracking

dextromethorphan

incentive salience

Pavlovian conditioning

addiction

Published by Elsevier Inc.