The characterization of an opioid medication's profile can be accomplished through a variety of experimental procedures. One useful procedure for assessing the profile of an opioid is a drug discrimination procedure. In this methodology, subjects are first trained to discriminate reference drugs such as placebo and an opioid agonist, and then administered doses of a novel compound to determine how like (or unlike) it is to the reference training conditions. Our laboratory has a long history of using this drug discrimination methodology to study and to characterize opioids with varying opioid receptor activity profiles. Studies have generally included either two or three training conditions in humans. Using this technique in volunteers, studies have characterized the profile of a number of opioids including (for example) butorphanol, nalbuphine, pentazocine, and buprenorphine.