A growing body of data hypothesizes the possibility of a conceptual framework linking the pathological learning, memory, and drug addiction. Recently, it has been hypothesized that when “habit-like” drug-seeking behavior is firmly acquired, the extinction of such behavior may be differentially influenced by engaging both habit and memory systems. Furthermore, a dissociation has been defined between cognitive (hippocampus-dependent) and habit (DS-dependent) memory systems, during an initial acquisition of learned behavior [81–83].

The second question is whether the three features presented above (aberrant motivation, hedonic dysregulation, and aberrant learning) underlying drug-addicted behavior could also be evaluated from a multi-emotional memory system point of view, highlighting a possible major role of aberrant learned associations between drug-associated stimuli and environmental factors, such as stress, driving the maladaptive compulsive seeking/taking behavior that is a main feature of drug addiction. Although there are emergent studies about the possible role of multi-emotional memory systems in drug addiction, little is known about the possible role of “habit memory” in psychopathological behavior characterizing drug addiction.

Finally, taken together, these four theories could contribute to better understanding the psychopathological features of drug addiction, such as the compulsive use of substances of abuse as well as the relapse. Thus, future works could aim to better understand the key elements characterizing the psycho-physio-pathological aspects of drug addiction.