(via Hannah Steinberg obituary | Science | The Guardian)

Pioneer of psychopharmacology who was one of the first researchers to test systematically how psychoactive drugs affect the mind

The development of drugs to treat mental afflictions was historically a hit-and-miss affair, without much understanding of their actions on brain pathways, and even less of their wider psychological impact. Hannah Steinberg, who has died aged 95, was one of the first researchers to test systematically how psychoactive drugs affect the mind.

Steinberg grasped that the brain produces its own pharmacopoeia of psychoactive substances in response to the challenges of daily living, and argued that the psychological consequences of adding drugs to the mix could not be reliably predicted. “Whatever you administer, you may disturb something else as well,” she said, adding that: “The drug companies on the whole don’t like that concept.”

During the 1960s, she and her colleague Ruth Rushton were among the first to set up rigorous experiments to test the effects of combinations of drugs, such as stimulants and antidepressants, on the behaviour of laboratory rats as well as human subjects, carefully recording responses at different doses.

One example was Drinamyl, a combination of barbiturates and amphetamines, which was then widely prescribed to “tired housewives” as it appeared to relieve depression. Colloquially known as purple hearts, it was also abused as a party drug. Steinberg looked at how it affected the level of activity or capacity to learn in laboratory animals, giving greater insight into what the drugs were actually doing to the brain.

Her research showed that combinations of drugs produced effects that could not be predicted from the actions of either drug alone. She also showed that the effect of a drug could be crucially dependent on the emotional state of the subject. Rats that were stressed by a change in their environment responded differently from those that were not. This led to a sideline in the welfare of laboratory animals, and much of Steinberg’s work informed the increasingly stringent guidelines that govern the use of animals in research.  …