point to important avenues of future research. We will also exhibit the strong bias that changes in synaptic function can best be assayed using electrophysiological techniques. Biochemical and imaging based measurements certainly provide important information that is critical for understanding the mechanisms underlying the synaptic and circuit adaptations caused by drugs of abuse. However, by definition, changes in synaptic function can only be unequivocally provided by directly measuring function and this requires recording the postsynaptic responses to afferent stimulation.
