David P. Friedman, Wake Forest School of Medicine, Wake Forest University, Winston-Salem, North Carolina, USA and Sue Rusche, National Families in Action, Atlanta, Georgia, USA

“The authors offer a nonbiased, scientific evaluation about what drug addiction really is and how it affects the brain.”
      — Jamie Biswas, Ph.D., National Institute on Drug Abuse

This book provides a scientific explanation of drug abuse and addiction for the general public. It clarifies the meaning of concepts such as intoxication, physical dependence, and addiction, and describes the changes in the brain that underlie these states. Indeed, this volume is unique because it presents a comprehensive picture of what actually happens to people and their brains when they chronically self-administer opiates, stimulants or alcohol. Complex mechanisms of drug action in the brain are made simple and comprehensible to the layman through use of informative analogies and salient graphics. Accounts of the effects of drug use and abuse on normal people create meaningful, easy-to-relate-to examples from everyday life.

Contents: Your Brain, Your Mind — Your Choice • Current Drug Users — Future Addicts? • How the Brain Is Organized • How the Parts of the Brain Communicate with Each Other • How Addictive Drugs Change the Way Neurons Communicate • How Drugs Get Into the Brain — and Out Again • Drugs Tell the Brain to Take More Drugs • How Drugs Change the Brain to Produce Intoxication, Tolerance, Sensitization, Physical Dependence, and Withdrawal • How Drugs Change the Brain to Produce Psychological Dependence, Craving, and Addiction • Intervention and Treatment • Therapeutic Use of Addictive Drugs: How Can a Bad Drug Be Good? • Summing It All Up

Readership: general public, students, and educators.