why are some drugs more phycologically addictive (to me?) than other drugs?

[evilbrain]

I get it that only some drugs are physically addictive.... like ive heard some like benzos and methodone can take over a month to kick (lucky the most w/d ive ever had were 4-5 days at worse).... but what about the phycological addictiveness? has any research been done on the subject with regards to brain chemistry?

here is my personal experience to help kick off the conversation (hopefully).... after 3 days of coke or speed binging, im like holy crap never doing that again...... but after disolving and snorting some tar, or mainlining some ecp, (a few times evry few hours for a few days)... im like.... ok so lets go over all the reasons not to do that again until the idea leaves my head.... like literally looking in the mirror and saying all the reasons im a good person

has the way the brain chemistry works been studied in regards to uppers / downers / painkillers post acute withdrawl? i should mention i do suffer from some symptoms of ADD and depression, but nothing that interferes with my being productive member of society (ie. i have job, friends, relative hapiness, etc)

after re-reading this, there is a tinge of "call for help", but really im just curious about how the brain works, specifically where our understanding of brain chemestry is at the current moment in time. do we know how/why the brain is permanently altered? is this even true (it seems all nervous systems repair themselves,... it just takes a very long time?

cheers,
-elbrujo

 

[sekio]

People like repeating experiences they find pleasurable as long as the reward outweighs the risk, whether that pleasure derives from situational factors (pain relief, socializing) or from internal ones (dopamine release), it's still something to build a habit around.

 

[psood0nym]

Yeah, psychological addiction is simply related to the costs and benefits of drugs and their reinforcement schedules (the faster a drug onsets and wears off the more a user will do it). I think the most psychologically addictive drugs are those that are easiest to rationalize using. The harder it is to come up with a reason "why not" in the near term the more psychologically addictive a drug is.

 

[Lightning-Nl]

has any research been done on the subject with regards to brain chemistry?

Not only has there been research done, the research is everywhere. You could access it with a simple Google inquiry.

But to answer your question, the reason why some drugs are more addicting than others (to you specifically) is because you're different than other people, and because you like doing things that make you feel good. Cocaine, and Methadone literally target the 'addiction' system directly. Their addictiveness is literally an exploit in human evolution. Because they mimic stimulus.

Dopamine plays a huge part in addiction because stimulus-response driven learning, is entirely mediated by Dopamine. These are things like; you perform this action - therefore, something good comes to you. Or - you perform this action, so something bad comes to you. If something good happens to you, Dopamine will be released. This motivates you to keep performing that behavior. Why? Because it felt good. Whereas on the other hand, if something bad happened to you - due to an action you executed; Dopamine will be released when you decide NOT to do that action.

Compulsive eating is another good example in a human evolution flaw. Back when humans couldn't get food whenever they wanted to - fatty meals were considered a luxury because tons of fat, sugar, carbohydrates, starch, etc. Meant that you would live longer because the food you just ate had a high amount of 'fuel'. A good comparison is higher octane Gasoline. Gasoline with a 'higher' octane amount, means that it has a much higher content of Hydrocarbons for the engine to combust. This leads to higher combustion rates inside the piston chamber and therefore, more energy is produced as a result.

Humans work exactly the same way. The more fuel you put into your body, the more energy that can be stored and used.

That's why humans evolved to have an obsessive need to obtain foods that 'taste good'. Because things that taste good, will provide you with much more energy than foods that don't taste good (as a rule). This would lead us to try to seek out fatty foods and it's one of the main reasons why humans have lived so long. But now that we can control our own food intake - this is no longer a good thing. Why? Because... it's become an addiction. Don't get me wrong, it was an addiction before we could manipulate our food intake, but this has been taken to the next level.

Tolerance is a big issue for drug users. Tolerance is a good thing actually. In general, it motivates us to keep looking for different things that are pleasurable. Why is this good? Because repetitive behaviors don't advance our species, and they don't advance our quality of life and this is were the biggest design flaw in humans exists.

Anyways - this post got way longer than I intended it too. I'll finish up the rest of my ideas here later.

 

[atara]

here is my personal experience to help kick off the conversation (hopefully).... after 3 days of coke or speed binging, im like holy crap never doing that again...... but after disolving and snorting some tar, or mainlining some ecp, (a few times evry few hours for a few days)... im like.... ok so lets go over all the reasons not to do that again until the idea leaves my head.... like literally looking in the mirror and saying all the reasons im a good person

Part of this is that opioids are simply way more addictive than cocaine. This can be noticed by a cursory examination of usage and death statistics -- opioid users die at over 20x the rate (fatalities per user) of cocaine users despite a similar therapeutic ratio. The comparison I've heard is "like walking into a warm room and you never knew you were cold" -- and this fits my experience with opioids, more or less.

I wonder if the common comparison of cocaine and heroin doesn't lead some people astray?

 

[Lightning-Nl]

I think addiction potential is subjective to be honest. It really depends on the person and what they find pleasurable.

For instance - ADHD is a great indicator for drug addiction. In fact, most people with ADHD have an addiction to Nicotine at some point in their lives. Whereas someone who's epileptic or has panic disorder, is likely to be addicted to Benzodiazepines at some point in their lives. The ladder is much less likely than the ADHD addiction potential (from what I can gather), but it exists apparently.

 

[Zilpe]

I think he's asking about something a little deeper. People do tend to be drawn to certain drugs, some people may find an experience unpleasurable simply because of physical side effects they get but I think there is more to it than that. I think personality plays a role in terms of what drugs appeal to you. I could never get addicted to stimulants but I find it hard to say no to dissociatives, conversly some people can't imagine repeating a dissociative experience more than once but can't stay away from amphetamine. At this point the distinction between psychological and physiological is a bit blurred, is it because some individuals have different receptor concentrations that they may prefer a certain drug or is it because it's psychologically what they're more in tune with? Is there even a difference? Who knows.