Are We Addicted to Addiction?

PROBABLY –

May 22, 2024 – At the heart of many of these claims is dopamine, a molecule that surges in the brain when people take some addictive drugs. But while dopamine has become a buzzword relating to anything rewarding – from sugar to social media likes – its role in addiction is incompletely understood. It was once thought that dopamine itself causes pleasure, but we now think it is really a signal that the brain should pay more attention to an unexpected event.

And, perhaps surprisingly, there is no universally agreed definition of addiction. Rather than focusing on the brain, various medical bodies look at how proposed addictions affect behaviour. For instance, someone may be considered to have an addiction if they want to stop the activity but can’t, if they experience cravings and if they tend to carry out the activity more and more. A person with gaming addiction may meet all those criteria, but someone who compulsively overeats seems unlikely to meet the last.

Really, it is unclear whether these definitions actually help. Perhaps, before we continue to create more mental health diagnoses, we should prioritise developing a better understanding of what addiction actually is.