Drugs, Crime, and the

Given the relationship between drug abuse and criminal behavior, it is important for criminologists to understand what drug addiction is and how it occurs. This article examines the process of becoming addicted to drugs (specifically, cocaine) via epigenetic processes. Frequent drug usage leads to an allostatic (the changing of a physiological system by the calibration its set points) brain changes in its pleasure centers. We first examine the reward dominance theory of approach-avoidance behavior, and then explore epigenetic processes in the context of the opponent process and the incentive-sensitization models of drug addiction, and in terms of environmental stress. Keywords drug abuse, epigenetics, allostasis, reward dominance, opponent process Researchers have found staggering numbers of drug addicts among incarcerated popu-lations and have conceded that drug abuse is an important correlate of deviant behav-ior, but few included an understanding of the biological process leading to drug addiction. Chronic drug abuse and criminality are housed within a much broader pro-pensity of some individuals to engage in a variety of antisocial behaviors, and this article clarifies the link and proposed shared mechanisms between criminal behavior and drug abuse through a molecular-genetic and neurobiological lens. Multiple genes, enzymes, and transcription factors are involved in drug addition, with more than 100 genes known to be changed with repeated cocaine exposure. The epigenetics of dru