Manifest Intent

60 Minutes recently ran a feature on "Why bad habits are hard to break." The video covers some of the newest neuro-news available on addictions, based on the work of Dr. Nora Volkow, the head of the National Institute on Drug Abuse. The video is very informative if you have not seen the show. CBS does not allow embedding, so please click the title link above.

By Katherine Harmon | April 24, 2012  in Scientific American
Although cocaine makes people feel more alert and on top of things in the moment, it can leave users vulnerable to a much slower brain in the long run. A new study shows that chronic use ages key parts of the brain at an accelerated rate. The findings were published online April 24 in Molecular Psychiatry.

Regular cocaine users often experience early cognitive decline and brain atrophy, and the new findings show how these users are, indeed, actually losing gray matter in their brain much faster than people who don’t take the drug.