The use of amphetamine type stimulants, particularly MDMA, is a global concern. Little research has been conducted on the association between MDMA use and everyday memory function—prospective memory. Twenty‐five MDMA users, 37 cannabis users, and 43 illicit substance‐naïve controls were assessed on their substance use history and reported prospective memory performance as measured by the...
Ecstasy (from the Greek, ekstasis: distraction; derangement; astonishment) is defined by dictionaries as (1) an emotional state so intense that one is carried beyond rational thought or self-control; (2) rapture associated with mystical experience. In this essay, we take the position that “addiction” is a social construct, a term that reflects a societal convention as much or more so that its...
Reviewed by: Hysteria Complicated by Ecstasy: The Case of Nanette Leroux Toby Gelfand Jan Goldstein . Hysteria Complicated by Ecstasy: The Case of Nanette Leroux. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2010. xi + 246 pp. Ill. $29.95 (978-0-691-01186-8). Nanette Leroux, an eighteen-year-old French peasant girl, fell gravely ill in the summer of 1822 with a bewildering array of nervous...
Ecstasy and LSD use is widespread in large Brazilian cities, but there is limited information on their use among young, middle-class, club goers in Brazil. We conducted standardized face-to-face interviews with 200 male and female ecstasy and/or LSD users, focusing on drug use and sexual history, current risk behaviors, and psychiatric symptomatology. Participants with early sexual debut...
Reviewed by: Paul in Ecstasy: The Neurobiology of the Apostle’s Life and Thought Dietmar Neufeld Colleen Shantz . Paul in Ecstasy: The Neurobiology of the Apostle’s Life and Thought. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009. Pp. v + 267. Cloth, US$64.00. ISBN 978-0-521-86610-1. In a provocative, long-overdue correction of a primarily cognicentric approach to Paul, Shantz charts a finely...
Ecstasy (±3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine, MDMA) is a popular recreational drug with known serotonergic neurotoxicity. Its long-term effects on dopaminergic function are less certain. Studying the long-term effects of ecstasy is often confounded by concomitant polydrug use and the short duration of abstinence. We used (18)F-dopa positron emission tomography (PET) to investigate the long-term...
High doses of the recreational drug 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA, "Ecstasy") have been well-documented to reduce the expression of serotonergic markers in several forebrain regions of rats and nonhuman primates. Neuroimaging studies further suggest that at least one of these markers, the plasma membrane serotonin transporter (SERT), may also be reduced in heavy Ecstasy users. Such...
3,4-Methylendioxymethamphetamine (MDMA) has both stimulatory and hallucinogenic properties which make its psychoactive effects unique and different from those of typical psychostimulant and hallucinogenic agents. The present study investigated the effects of MDMA on extracellular dopamine (DA(ex)) and serotonin (5-HT(ex)) levels in the striatum and prefrontal cortex (PFC) using in vivo...