The Brain’s Reward System and Addiction to Pornography

The reward system of the brain is the reason that people get addicted to pornography, just like they indeed get hooked on to gambling or binge eating. This behavior of viewing porn reinforces an action neuropeptide called dopamine, which is typically responsible for reward and satisfaction. This leads to an incessant and compulsive need to view it, resulting in an addiction, similar to that of alcohol or drugs. Repeatedly viewing the pornographic content will lead to the desensitization of the system, which will require even more graphic material for the same response. Its innate response is potentially the reason for addiction to pornography in the same way as any other substance that is addictive. Even the thought of or viewing explicit sexual content can be a reason for addiction

Alteration of the Brain and Desensitization

The regular use of porn affects the neural circuitry of the brain, in the sense that the pathways that are responsible for the pornographic behavior are strengthened while the ones responsible for the other behaviors are weakened. This also contributes towards rapid desensitization whereby the reward center of the brain become less responsive to the natural enjoyable stimuli. In this scenario, the thrill seeking individual is forced to advance or more dire content in order to simulate the same response or seek it out. This rewiring or addiction does not only relate to sexually provocative content or behavior but other aspects as well such as motivation, reward and emotional control. The brain only learns to have the pleasure response from extreme and even novel stimulation and as a result the other activitiess, which are everyday life activities, go unresponsive.

Psycho-Social Effects of Watching Pornography: Looking at It from the Social Aspect

Porn use affects the brain in multiple ways and one of the consequences of it is that the person exhibits changes in performing functions other than sex. One study suggested Marked changes in prefrontal cortex engagement which appears to be central for executive functioning processes such as decision making and impulse control. It translates to having attention deficit hyperactivity symptoms being unable to control urges and increases the tendency to act on impulses in multiple situations. Moreover, such changes in dopamine pathways can lead to low motivation and reward processing in the normal activities resulting in anhedonia or inability to enjoy normal non-pornographic activities. All these effects of porn usage at the neurological levels partially explain sexually driven compulsive behavior and porn tendencies to self-modulate more than just in the context of sexual function.

Low levels of activity in the upper portion of the brain and Low levels of activity in the upper region of the brain

Low levels of activity in the upper portion of the brain assessed using neuroimaging techniques such as MRI has also been used so evidence low levels of activity in the upper region of the brain to increased prevalence of several forms of addictions including Pornography and Hypofrontality is one of the cases where low activity is evident. This part of the brain is responsible for higher cognitive abilities such as impulse regulation and control, planning activities, and other executive decision making tasks. Recent studies have indicated that Pornography brain normalization can cause significant changes in prefrontal functions where there is a loss of ability to inhibit impulses leading to a reduction in the ability to delay gratification which can occur in areas that are not sexual in nature. This would include greater propensity to engage in or succumb to never-ending impulses to engage in exorbitantly expensive purchases, overeating, and other experiences that can be considered addictive. To an extent, this executive function impairment of hypofrontality adds to the addiction aspects of pornography consumption and its effects on other areas of one’s behaviour.

DYSFUNCTION IN STRESS SYSTEM

SEXUAL CONTENT ESCALATION & SHAME INDULGING TYPE OF GENRES

In the words of Victor Hugo, ‘tolerance is the worst trait of human character’, and he could have been referencing the compulsive behavior to increase the tolerance. To best comprehend the term, tolerance, it best to first understand what it means in the context of substance abuse, and then relating that to the overconsumption of porn. Simply put, tolerance in form of addiction is the capacity to use greater amounts of a substance without exhibiting undesirable side effects. This typically leads to the individual losing or disregarding goals associated with a decrease in the excessive use of the substance. In brief, tolerance can lead to promiscuous and damaging behaviors. Now let’s shift our focus on the compulsive behavior which is usually a direct result of the consumption of porn.. In this context, you’ll find value in https://www.teenixxx.com/categories/35/mommy As mentioned earlier, the hope and the expectation of the reward can often lead to engaging in harmful behaviors. Compulsivity manifests itself with thoughts to a continuous pursuit of engaging in risky behaviors for instant gratification, so as to watch porn empathetically. Combining the past two paragraphs, it’s quite clear that the deleterious compulsions have been likened to causes or motivations behind gambling, gaming and substance abuse; the only differentiating factor was the dimension, that the motivation merging these behaviors was shifting the focus towards the expectation of the reward and away from the urge. Moving forward, it’s crucial to note that the concern to compulsivity followed a linear model of analysis, shifting the focus away from the responsibility serves a far greater purpose than immediate satisfaction, as Babette Rothschild philosophically states, “the image of time and space entwined” the intertwining nurtures and promotes the realization of satisfying natural rewards that will further promote the growth of important neural connections.

The Effect of Sexual Stimuli Consumption on Dopamine and Its Circuit

To begin with discussing the consumption of sexual stimuli and its consumption on both dopamine secretion and is believed to be stimulated within the reward circuit of the brain, which acts as a means of enhancing the behavior and creating a pleasurable feeling. The dopamine secretion can very easily be overbearing and activating, which creates a cycle of repetition and with time leads upwards of overriding the natural pathways from the brain which act as a means of rewards. As time passes, this leads towards downregulation of the dopamine receptors meaning any and all kinds of natural rewards both become unhanging and naturally disatisfying, over time this can lead towards manifestations of anhedonia which leads to reduction of the ability of experiencing pleasure in sexual activities, and other non sexual activities i.e., gambling and extreme sport which lead toward acts of addiction. There circuit reward’s alteration, on the other hand, tends to lure and affect impulse control and decision making, which can ultimately result towards engaging in reckless behavioral patterns to get the feeling of high from dopamine stimulation.

Compulsiveness and Conditioned Ultrareactivity

Watching pornographic content leads towards repeated stimulation of sexual excitements which as a result leads towards conditioned ultrareactivity, where there is an excessive and abnormal stimulation towards the cues of pronography which may not even have any connection to it. For instance, certain images, sounds, and situations are able to activate the desire and want of pornographic content which results the individual to go through the urge even if in a situation that is not sexual in nature. As a whole, all of these tend to create an overreaching neuro response towards sexual excitation and in a wider sense regulate pornography fixation. For example, people who are preoccupied with pornographic stimuli, for instance, become nervous or angry for no reason when they are exposed to non-sexual stimuli and become anxious.

Mitchell and Gotlib (2004) have reported that the body goes through an increased level of arousal alongside heightened states of craving. To cope with this increased feeling, people may engage in gaming, overeating or excessive use of the internet. Furthermore, they also argue that porn in today’s world has developed into a more advanced sociological tool, having adverse effects in disrupting nuclei within the limbic system, which is responsible for developing appropriate sexual behavior, but sociologically aids in shaping patterns of self-regulation in conjunction with self-reactivity and self-controlled stimuli. Furthermore, the consumption of porn has a negative effect on sexual behavior attitudes and violence against women.

How Neural Pathways Are Affected

Sensitizing mechanisms such as, substance addiction, promote artificial want through abuse while concurrently focusing on porn and other neural pathways. Abuse coupled with porn consumption jumbles neural pathways and strengthens them, the same way drugs would do. This would fuse them with specific interference which would otherwise enable normal activities such as working to begin with internally seeking for porn. This amalgamation of interference would lead to compulsive behavior urges. A gradual increase of dislocation within the brain pathways and subsequently seeking porn over previously enjoyed activities dilutes the internal neural pathways. This would explain why an individual would enjoy being socially active or being productive at work but not anymore. Watching excessive amounts of porn alters afferent neurons, brain coordination and even functional networks in the brain. This explains why individuals tend to develop low self-esteem alongside aggressive decision making and subsequent outcomes due to lack of impulse control, which in turn triggers excessive consumption of porn and eventually other sub-medicinal activities. The amplification of these neural pathways related to sex demonstrates the role porn has on self-related behaviors that would eventually or in parallel allow them to become compulsive in nature.

Symptoms Indicating a Physical Aspect of a Pornography Addiction

Internet Pornography as a behavioral addiction has some physical symptoms as well,  which normally would be unrelated to sexual activity. These include the overuse of a computer and other devices which can result in: carpal tunnel syndrome, eye strain, headaches and sleep problems. Another symptom is installing the obsessive interest in pornography to personal hygiene, diet and exercise and these factors contributing to weight gain/loss, decreased energy and depressed immune system. More so, these types of addiction use to disregard the twitches within the norm of sleep cycles and scratching the surges of dopamine which lead to problems such as insomnia or excessive daytime drowsiness that diminishes physical health and wellbeing. All these physical symptoms are basically an extension of the psychological pattern of behaviour and demonstrate that the addiction is even more complex than what may be envisaged because even now over a billion people are addicted to porn in a global perspective.