Addicted brain: the effects of drugs, alcohol or the Internet

What effect do drugs have on the brain? Is it possible to be addicted to the Internet or to shopping? Why do addictions occur?

These and other questions about how some practices can become an addiction are the focus of the content of the new video in the series "The secrets of your brain", a project of the University of Navarra that brings together the latest advances in Neuroscience on the functioning of our brain, prepared by the Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Natalia López Moratalla and Carlos Bernar, specialist in Audiovisual Communication at the academic center.

According to Dr. López Moratalla, what we understand by addiction is a learning process with rewards that becomes pathological and ends up ruining the life project of the person affected and those around them. In this process, both the release of dopamine and our report play a fundamental role.

Dopamine is the neurotransmitter that processes states of positive emotion and that, therefore, we naturally secrete in the face of risk, adventure or curiosity for the unknown. Circumstances that provoke in us an innate pleasure, more or less according to each temperament.

"Before a pleasurable status -clarifies Dr. López Moratalla- the neurons of the nucleus accumbens receive dopamine, while the amygdala evaluates the expected reward. Likewise, the brain has mechanisms to control the release of this substance and which allow us to maintain a balance so that we are neither euphoric nor apathetic for no reason".

Drugs: a "deadly" consumption

Precisely the way drugs work is to break this balance of dopamine, increasing its concentration in the synapse space or prolonging the time it remains before being captured.

In the case of cocaine, according to the University of Navarra video, its consumption blocks the dopamine reuptake, so that it remains longer in the space between synapses, prolonging the pleasurable effect. Amphetamine also increases the amount of dopamine released. Nicotine, on the other hand, directly stimulates the neurons that produce it. And in the case of ecstasy, the neurons are literally destroyed.

"If drug use becomes chronic, dopamine receptors decrease and remain at low levels even a year after quitting. Hence, the pleasurable effects gradually diminish, creating the need for a greater quantity to achieve the same effect," explains the professor.

However, addiction does not develop after a first consumption. It is a long process of learning consolidation in which report intervenes: "With chronic drug use, the process by which the connections between neurons are established is modified, since the excess stimulation produced by dopamine accelerates long-term memory deadline. In parallel, the hippocampus establishes the emotional report , which is essential in addiction," argues Dr. López Moratalla.

Addiction versus freedom

In fact, in the beginning of drug use, or Internet games, environmental circumstances are learned unconsciously, so that the reward is associated with something: a smell, a place... "If we perceive it again, dopamine promotes the unconscious memory associated with the reward. Under normal conditions, we would select the response after analyzing the data. However, when addiction has occurred, the functioning is different: control over frontal lobe circuits is lost and automatic and compulsive responses are generated. Those who suffer from addiction do not decide, but are forced to consume," warns the researcher.

Most addictive behaviors begin in adolescence, when the reward systems and emotional report are not adjusted: "So, while alcohol or drugs produce more intense effects and a faster dependence in girls, boys fall more easily into role-playing games on the Internet," explains the professor of the University of Navarra.

In view of this situation, Dr. López Moratalla stresses that the most effective way to prevent addictions is Education,"which opens up horizons, and personal relationships, which allow for frank dialogue. It is important that everyone agrees with themselves on limits to the amounts, frequency and time employee in these practices. In addition, the conviction of having one's own destiny in one's own hands, overcoming a crisis, and not being alone, are a good prevention against falling into the destructive network of dependencies and addictions".

area of Scientific Communication

The secrets of your brain" series