Scott Brassart

Brain Basics

For many years, scientists believed that once the brain was fully developed, it basically remained static. With the advent of neuroimaging tools, in particular fMRI and PET scans, we now know that this is not the case. The brain is malleable. It changes over time. Every time we learn new things or memorize new information or have a new experience, the brain changes and adapts. The scientific term for this is neuroplasticity.

Regarding our understanding of porn addiction, one notable result of neuroplasticity is that exposure to addictive substances and behaviors significantly affect how the neural networks of the brain are organized. What this means, stated in simpler terms, is neurons that fire together will wire together. As we go through life, we create pathways in the brain, and those pathways, once formed, are there for life (unless there is some sort of traumatic brain injury to disrupt them).

Think about a toddler learning to walk. As they first start out, they must concentrate on every aspect of walking. Their cute little faces pinch as they first lift a foot, then wobble, then think, OK, now I move it forward. You can almost see the mental cogs turning as they take their first steps. Two weeks later, of course, they’re tearing around the house like Olympic sprinters because they’ve burned a “walking neuropathway” into their brain. Once they’ve done that, they just decide to walk and they’re immediately doing it without conscious thoughts of how. And unless they suffer some sort of trauma to the brain, they never think about the how of walking again.

Addiction and Neuropathways

Without question, the use of addictive substances and behaviors burns pathways in the brain. Over time, as those pathways become an addict’s go-to coping mechanism, they are reinforced. This occurs to a point where we can tell if a person is addicted simply by looking at an fMRI scan of their brain. The person doesn’t even have to be actively engaging in the addiction for us to know they’re addicted. We can even see what kind of an addict a person is. If they’re an alcoholic, we can tell by looking at their brain. If they’re an opiate addict, we can tell. If they’re a cocaine addict, we can tell that, too.

Except we might be wrong about the cocaine addict because that person might instead be a porn addict. Cocaine addict brains and porn addict brains are indistinguishable. This means the neurochemical impact of cocaine and the neurochemical impact of porn are the same. We will discuss the importance of this fact in a few moments. For now, simply file away the idea that from a neurobiological standpoint, the impacts of cocaine and pornography are shockingly similar.

The Neurochemistry of Addiction

Before we talk specifically about how porn addiction impacts the brain, let’s examine the impact on the brain of addictions in general—i.e., what happens in the brain that creates addiction and what happens in the brain that makes it so hard for addicts to quit and stay quit.

The basic addiction process is as follows:

• In the human brain, a small portion of the brain known as the nucleus accumbens controls the experience of pleasure, desire, and motivation. For simplicity’s sake, this region is sometimes referred to as the pleasure center or the rewards center.
• The rewards center is activated (we feel pleasure) when we engage in naturally occurring, life-affirming stimuli such as eating, playing, learning, being sexual, helping others, etc. These activities are rewarded because they ensure, in various ways, survival of both the individual and the species.
• This pleasure response is two-pronged, involving the release and reception of various neurochemicals: mostly dopamine but also adrenaline, serotonin, oxytocin, various endorphins, and a few others. For purposes of this discussion, however, we will focus on dopamine.
• Some neurons release dopamine, other neurons receive it, and both actions must occur before we experience pleasure. It’s like a lamp. It doesn’t turn on until someone plugs it in and completes the circuit.
• When pleasure is experienced, the reward center tells the mood, memory, and decision-making regions of the brain how much it enjoyed eating, playing, learning, being sexual, helping a friend, or whatever. This encourages us to engage in these life-sustaining activities again in the future. In short, the experience of pleasure creates desire and motivation that ensures survival.

That’s awesome, right?

Unfortunately, the rewards center can be manipulated. Alcohol, addictive drugs, and intensely stimulating behaviors (like gambling and viewing pornography) can be used to artificially stimulate the system, flooding the brain with unusually high levels of dopamine. And then, as is the case with all pleasurable experiences, this pleasure-related information is conveyed to areas of the brain dealing with mood, memory, and decision-making, creating motivation to repeat the behavior.

Is it any wonder that addicts go back for more, more, and still more?

But still, everything seems OK. A little excess pleasure never hurt anyone, right? Except it can, and it does. In fact, at this point, the story of addiction and the brain starts to get ugly.

• As discussed earlier, the brain is malleable and adaptive. As part of this process, it monitors itself and, when necessary, it adjusts internally. For example, if a person goes blind, their brain will heighten their other senses to compensate. This is a good (and amazing) thing. Except…
• When the brain is consistently overstimulated, as occurs with the heavy use of addictive substances and behaviors, it recognizes the ongoing neurochemical imbalance and adjusts (heals) by reducing the number of neurons that release and receive dopamine. (Mostly it cuts down on the number of dopamine receptors.) Basically, the brain uses an internal “dimmer switch” to reduce the amount of pleasure the user experiences from a particular activity. As the brain adjusts in this fashion, addictive substances and behaviors have less of an impact.
• With this, addicts up the ante, so to speak, as they attempt to achieve the neurochemical pleasure response they’re used to. Typically, they use more of an addictive substance or behavior or a more intense version of an addictive substance or behavior to get the desired high.
• Then, the brain down-regulates yet again.
• Despite this continual loss of the ability to experience pleasure from an addictive substance or behavior, the mood, memory, and decision-making regions of the brain remember the initial enjoyment and desire the same experience. Thus, the motivation to use remains despite the loss of in-the-moment pleasure.

In this way, liking an addictive substance or behavior transforms into wanting/needing an addictive substance or behavior. Even though the stimulus no longer provides the pleasure it once did, the user wants and needs to continue.

Tolerance and Escalation

As addictions progress, the neurobiological down-regulation of dopamine release and reception in the rewards center creates two of the more common signs of addiction: tolerance and escalation. With tolerance and escalation, addicts must use more of an addictive substance or behavior or a more intense version of an addictive substance or behavior to get the desired high.

Consider heroin addiction. Heroin addicts almost never start out shooting heroin. Instead, they have a few beers at a party in middle school. By the time they’re in high school, they’re drinking a six-pack, or they’ve switched to hard liquor, or they’re smoking pot. Then they’re stealing grandma’s pain pills and crushing them into the pot they smoke. Before long, they’re snorting the pills for faster effect. Suddenly, with no real knowledge of how they got there, they find themselves in a back alley with a needle in their arm.

This same tolerance and escalation process occurs with all addictions, including porn addiction. In fact, escalation is incredibly easy to track with porn addicts, as both the amount and intensity of pornography increase as the addiction progresses. Most porn addicts, by the time they seek help, find themselves viewing porn that would have scared them or even turned them off when they first started. In the beginning, partial nudity and softcore were more than enough. By the end, the more taboo, the better.

Cocaine vs. Porn

As discussed previously, humans have a pleasure center in the brain that gives us a reward (feelings of pleasure wrought by the release and reception of dopamine) for behaviors that help us survive as both individuals and as a species. For example, cooperation, eating, belonging, and sex are all behaviors that are essential for survival. Engaging in these behaviors creates natural rewards that motivate us to do things that keep us and our species alive.

Our baseline level of dopamine (an arbitrary number set by neuroscientists for ease of use) is 100. When we are at rest with nothing much going on, good or bad, our dopamine level is 100. When we eat a nice meal, our dopamine level increases to about 120. Hanging out with friends gets us to around 130. Eating a nice meal with friends pushes the dopamine up a bit further. With orgasm, we reach the top of the naturally occurring rewards scale: 200.

• Baseline: 100
• Food: 120
• Time with Friends: 130
• Orgasm: 200

Unfortunately, addictive drugs (especially stimulants) and addictive behaviors can hijack the dopamine reward system, potentially causing the release of higher amounts of dopamine than we get through natural rewards.

• Nicotine: 220
• Cocaine: 350
• Methamphetamine: 1300

That’s right, nicotine gives a bigger dopamine rush than an orgasm! Is it any wonder people struggle to quit cigarettes? Meth, of course, provides a veritable explosion of dopamine, and, as such, it is generally regarded as the absolute hardest drug to quit and stay quit. (It also rots people’s teeth—the hardest substance in the human body—so imagine what it does to the soft tissue of brains, livers, kidneys, and the like.)

This brings us back to cocaine. As stated earlier in this chapter, fMRI scans show that the brains of cocaine and porn addicts are virtually indistinguishable. From this, we may conclude that the high provided by pornography closely matches the high provided by cocaine: 350.

Interestingly, pornography gives users a bigger high (350) than the orgasm (200) that is supposedly the goal of porn use. In fact, many porn addicts describe the orgasm at the end of a porn binge as a letdown.

Anhedonia (Inability to Experience Pleasure)

Whatever a person’s drug of choice happens to be, as usage escalates, the brain continues to adjust, reducing the amount of dopamine released and the number of dopamine receptors. Unfortunately, this turns the pleasure volume down on more than just the addiction. All forms of pleasure, including natural rewards like eating a nice meal, being friendly, playing, learning, and feeling connected, are dampened.

Over time, many addicts find it difficult to experience pleasure through either normal or supernormal means. Often, they are unable to experience natural rewards at all, and with their addiction they are simply feeding the beast, using porn not to get high but to get back to baseline. This condition of constant mild depression in the absence of active addiction is known as anhedonia. Anhedonia occurs because, as stated above, when the brain turns the volume down on addiction, it adjusts the entire rewards system; the volume is turned down on everything.

The good news for addicts is that the brain resets (heals itself) with sobriety. The rewards system eventually (usually after six months to one year of good sobriety) returns to baseline. Just as the brain recognizes that there is too much dopamine floating around, it will recognize that there is not enough dopamine floating around, and it will turn the dimmer switch in the other direction.

Until that happens, however, addicts may struggle to enjoy life, to connect, and to avoid relapsing. Often, it helps recovering addicts to know that their inability to feel pleasure from anything other than active addiction is a temporary phase of recovery. The brain is healing as fast as it can, and eventually they will be able to enjoy all aspects of life—even the small and simple pleasures.

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If you or someone you care about is struggling with sex, porn, or substance/sex addiction, help is available. Seeking Integrity offers inpatient treatment for sex, porn, and substance/sex addicts, as well as low-cost online workgroups. At the same time, SexandRelationshipHealing.com offers a variety of free webinars and drop-in discussion groups, podcasts, and more.