What the study does establish is that the pharmacological dynamics of substance use and potential addiction are not inventions of modernity.

The same molecular mechanisms — arecoline acting at muscarinic receptors, producing stimulant effects, providing analgesia that might reinforce use — were present and operating on Ice Age humans in the same ways they operate on modern users.

The Pharmacological Experiments: Frog Egg Cells And Human Receptors

One of the most technically distinctive aspects of the study is the pharmacological work conducted by Roger Papke’s group, which provided the experimental evidence that intact areca nuts can release physiologically active arecoline during sucking.

This question — can you get the drug by sucking the whole nut, or do you need to process it? — is central to the interpretation of the ancient dental wear.