spini4
Bluelighter
- Joined
- Nov 18, 2003
- Messages
- 795
So video games are addictive—this we know.
It comes down to dopamine, one of the brain’s basic signaling molecules. Emotionally, we feel dopamine as pleasure, engagement, excitement, creativity, and a desire to investigate and make meaning out of the world. It’s released whenever we take risks, or encounter novelty. From an evolutionary standpoint, it reinforces exploratory behavior.
More importantly, dopamine is a motivator. It’s released when we have the expectation of reward. And once this neurotransmitter becomes hardwired into a psychological reward loop, the desire to get more of that reward becomes the brain’s overarching preoccupation. Cocaine, widely considered the most addictive drug on the planet, does little more than flood the brain with dopamine and block its reuptake (sort of like SSRI’s block the reuptake of serotonin).
Video games are full of novelty, risk-taking, reward-anticipation, and exploratory behavior. They’re dopamine-production machines dressed up with joysticks and better graphics. And this is why video games are so addictive.
But this is only where things are today. There are a host of additional pleasure chemicals floating around our brains. Consider endorphins, the brain’s own version of opium. Or anandamide, which is essentially the brain’s natural version of marijuana. Or serotonin, which is calming and peaceful in low doses (Prozac) and, in higher does, the fuel behind both ecstasy and LSD.
Right now, we don’t know enough about manipulating this neurochemistry to routinely trick the brain into releasing this cascade of chemicals via video game—but that will change.
In my last blog, I wrote about the peak state of consciousness known as “flow,” where we feel our best and perform our best. To understand what’s coming with video games, it’s actually helpful to know a bit more about flow.
While there’s more work to be done, we now believe that during flow, the brain gets high on an extremely potent neurochemical cocktail, blending norepinephrine, dopamine, endorphins, anandamide and serotonin. To put this in street drug terms, flow produces a rapid hit of speed, heroin, ecstasy, marijuana, and cocaine. This is also why researchers consider “flow” the source code of intrinsic motivation or, in plainer language, seriously addictive.
We also know that video games can put players into low-grade flow states—but they’re really not much more than dopamine loops. Now, certainly, these loops are fun and addictive, but they’re nothing compared to what happens when we can marshal flow’s full complement of neurochemicals.
Pretty soon, we’ll have video games that trigger endorphins and anandamide and serotonin and dopamine and all the rest. This will happen because our neuro-imaging and sensing technologies are experiencing their own version of Moore’s Law and this will continue to enhance our understanding of how to control the brain’s internal chemistry. It will happen because we are starting to understand a great deal more about flow itself, and what triggers the state. And it will happen because our games are becoming more immersive, more virtual, more like reality.
Today, “serious gaming” using VR is how we train astronauts, military pilots, and, more and more, surgeons. Why? Because, the science shows, our brains respond to second hand stimulus (a virtual world) in ways that mirror first person experiences and—more importantly—the brain can be tricked/trained into deepening those responses (treating phantom limb pain with a simple mirror technique is a great example).
Read more at:http://www.forbes.com/sites/stevenk...heroin-is-virtual-reality-our-next-hard-drug/
It comes down to dopamine, one of the brain’s basic signaling molecules. Emotionally, we feel dopamine as pleasure, engagement, excitement, creativity, and a desire to investigate and make meaning out of the world. It’s released whenever we take risks, or encounter novelty. From an evolutionary standpoint, it reinforces exploratory behavior.
More importantly, dopamine is a motivator. It’s released when we have the expectation of reward. And once this neurotransmitter becomes hardwired into a psychological reward loop, the desire to get more of that reward becomes the brain’s overarching preoccupation. Cocaine, widely considered the most addictive drug on the planet, does little more than flood the brain with dopamine and block its reuptake (sort of like SSRI’s block the reuptake of serotonin).
Video games are full of novelty, risk-taking, reward-anticipation, and exploratory behavior. They’re dopamine-production machines dressed up with joysticks and better graphics. And this is why video games are so addictive.
But this is only where things are today. There are a host of additional pleasure chemicals floating around our brains. Consider endorphins, the brain’s own version of opium. Or anandamide, which is essentially the brain’s natural version of marijuana. Or serotonin, which is calming and peaceful in low doses (Prozac) and, in higher does, the fuel behind both ecstasy and LSD.
Right now, we don’t know enough about manipulating this neurochemistry to routinely trick the brain into releasing this cascade of chemicals via video game—but that will change.
In my last blog, I wrote about the peak state of consciousness known as “flow,” where we feel our best and perform our best. To understand what’s coming with video games, it’s actually helpful to know a bit more about flow.
While there’s more work to be done, we now believe that during flow, the brain gets high on an extremely potent neurochemical cocktail, blending norepinephrine, dopamine, endorphins, anandamide and serotonin. To put this in street drug terms, flow produces a rapid hit of speed, heroin, ecstasy, marijuana, and cocaine. This is also why researchers consider “flow” the source code of intrinsic motivation or, in plainer language, seriously addictive.
We also know that video games can put players into low-grade flow states—but they’re really not much more than dopamine loops. Now, certainly, these loops are fun and addictive, but they’re nothing compared to what happens when we can marshal flow’s full complement of neurochemicals.
Pretty soon, we’ll have video games that trigger endorphins and anandamide and serotonin and dopamine and all the rest. This will happen because our neuro-imaging and sensing technologies are experiencing their own version of Moore’s Law and this will continue to enhance our understanding of how to control the brain’s internal chemistry. It will happen because we are starting to understand a great deal more about flow itself, and what triggers the state. And it will happen because our games are becoming more immersive, more virtual, more like reality.
Today, “serious gaming” using VR is how we train astronauts, military pilots, and, more and more, surgeons. Why? Because, the science shows, our brains respond to second hand stimulus (a virtual world) in ways that mirror first person experiences and—more importantly—the brain can be tricked/trained into deepening those responses (treating phantom limb pain with a simple mirror technique is a great example).
Read more at:http://www.forbes.com/sites/stevenk...heroin-is-virtual-reality-our-next-hard-drug/
