Depressive symptoms modulate the subjective and physiological response to cocaine in humans

The goal of this study was to examine the relationship between the presence of subclinical depressive symptoms and physiological and subjective respon ses to smoked cocaine in humans. Cocaine users without major depression, wh o participated in various inpatient studies, received a single 0.4 mg/kg of smoked cocaine. When the relationship between the Beck Depression Inventor y (BDI) scores and various subjective and physiological responses to cocain e was examined, similar trends were found. Low BDI scores of 0-7 were assoc iated with a smaller physiological and subjective cocaine response. In cont rast, BDI ranges of 8-13 were associated with enhanced cocaine response whi ch plateaued or declined in the higher (> 14) BDI group. These group differ ences were not explained by sex or body weight differences among groups. Th e implication of these results is that the presence of depressive symptoms may affect cocaine use behavior partly by being associated with an enhanced response to cocaine. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science Ireland Ltd. All rights res erved.