Semester

Spring

Date of Graduation

2021

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Type

MS

College

Eberly College of Arts and Sciences

Department

Psychology

Committee Chair

Karen G. Anderson

Committee Member

Kathryn Kestner

Committee Member

Steven Kinsey

Abstract

Cannabidiol (CBD) is one of the major centrally active phytocannabinoid components of cannabis, and has been approved by the FDA only for the treatment of two rare seizure disorders. However, CBD has been touted as a potential treatment for anxiety in place of more traditional treatments like benzodiazepines. Although there is some evidence of anxiolytic effects of CBD, its suitability as a substitute for benzodiazepines is unknown. This experiment was designed to assess to what extent CBD shares interoceptive discriminative-stimulus properties with the anxiolytic chlordiazepoxide (CDP), a benzodiazepine. In the present experiment, a range of doses (0-333.3 mg/kg) of over-the-counter CBD oil were administered in rats trained to discriminate 5.6 mg/kg CDP from saline. Due to the long time-course effects of CBD, generalization tests were conducted at 90 and 120 min post-CBD administration. The two highest doses of CBD tested (166.7 and 333.3 mg/kg) were found to partially substitute for 5.6 mg/kg CDP, with mean percent responding on the CDP-associated lever reaching above 20% in Test Two Only (120 min post-CBD administration), suggesting that the over-the-counter CBD oil used in this experiment shares interoceptive discriminative-stimulus properties to some degree with CDP.

Embargo Reason

Publication Pending

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