Gender Differences in Cocaine Self-Administration in Rats: Relevance to Human Drug-Taking Behavior

Recent data indicate that there is an interaction between psychostimulant drugs and gonadal hormones. Mello and colleagues (1994) have collected convincing evidence suggesting that psychomotor drugs can disrupt or alter ovarian and hypophysial hormonal function. The reverse of this also appears to be true; that is, these hormones can affect the physiological and behavioral response to cocaine (Glick et al. 1983; Van Haaren and Anderson 1994) as well as to other drugs of abuse such as amphetamine (Beatty and Holzer 1978; Brass and Glick 1981; Camp et al. 1986) and alcohol (Sutker et al. 1983). This chapter presents data suggesting that ovarian hormones also can influence the reinforcing effects of cocaine in laboratory animals as well as a discussion of whether these data have clinical relevance to drug addiction in women.