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Reinforcement and Extinction
Alcohol drinking is learned. The craving and the continual thinking about alcohol are both gradually learned. This learning involves the opiate receptors where morphine acts. Alcohol causes some neurons to release a substance like morphine that fits into opiate receptors, reinforcing the alcohol drinking. This tends to cause more drinking, causing more reinforcement, more drinking, etc., in a vicious circle.
![[The process]](eng_graphic2.gif)
Some people, due to genetics and experience, have alcohol drinking grow so strong that it dominates their lives. They cannot control their drinking, nor can anyone else.
Pharmacological extinction with naltrexone reverses the process
Learned responses can be removed: they are extinguished if made while reinforcement is blocked. Extinction of alcohol drinking progressively weakens the craving for alcohol, decreases incessant thinking about alcohol, and reduces the chances of relapse. Used correctly, pharmacological extinction, in effect, reaches into the nervous system and safely removes the unwanted, life-threatening behaviour that has grown beyond control.
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