Scientists have identified the part of the brain that may hold the key to why some cocaine users become addicts while others just take the drug socially, researchers said on Tuesday.

Brain scans of cocaine users while they performed simple computer tasks showed changes in the part of the brain responsible for controlling behavior and making appropriate decisions, they said.

This could explain why some people find it easier to quit than others and may shed light on long-term addiction, said Hugh Garavan, a cognitive neuroscientist at Trinity College Dublin who presented his research to a meeting of the Royal Society in London.

"Most people who try to quit drugs relapse," Garavan said in a telephone interview. "It might have to do with how intact these brain regions are."

Cocaine, initially used in patent medicines, beverages and tonics around the turn of the 20th Century, is a drug that in powdered form can be snorted or dissolved in water and injected. Its derivative crack cocaine is even more powerful.

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