This post is part of a
mini-series on porn.
Your Brain is Jacked
Your brain is incredible. One of the many things it does is encourage your survival by rewarding you when you do things that are good for you. Your brain will trigger the release of dopamine and oxytocin to make you feel good when you do things like eat, exercise, or have sex.
But this reward system can be hijacked. You probably know that drugs, like cocaine and opioids, trigger the release of massive amounts of dopamine without the healthy activities that normally trigger the reward. This breaking of the natural process leads to all sorts of adverse effects, including addiction.
However, what you may not know is that there are other activities, perceived as less dangerous by society, that hijack your brain in exactly the same way as cocaine. Porn is one of these activities.
The Brain Chemistry of Addiction
When you view porn, your body releases a surge of dopamine that gives you a high. Like all highs, this makes you feel great and gives you energy. In addition, your brain builds a "pathway" using a protein called iFosB ("delta fos b") that will act like a bread crumb trail to lead you back to the same activity that triggered the release of dopamine.
The more you watch porn, the more iFosB pathways are laid in your brain, making it easier and easier to do. Eventually the "pathways" can become a "highway" where your brain's traffic typically flows. At this point, looking porn becomes a habit.
It is so natural that you may even do it involuntarily.
At the same time the iFosB "highway" is being built, your body has continued releasing surges of dopamine every time you watch porn. Eventually, your body builds up a tolerance to these unnaturally high levels of dopamine.
The brain does this by reducing the number of chemical receptors for dopamine. This means that the porn is still releasing the same levels of dopamine, but you can't feel it. These leads to some terrible repercussions.
The Effects of Porn Addiction on Your Brain
First, to get the same high as before, you have to either view more porn, view porn more often, or view more hardcore porn. This is dangerous, as the brain tissue involved with sexual preferences (i.e., what “turns us on”) is especially malleable.
As noted by Norman Doidge, MD in his essay, "The Social Costs of Pornography", outside stimuli, like porn, that link previously unrelated things (e.g., physical torture and sexual arousal) can cause previously unrelated neurons within the brain to learn to “fire” in tandem so that the next time around, physical torture actually does trigger sexual arousal in the brain.
As a result numerous studies have shown that habitual porn viewing led the subjects to desire things like child pornography or violent pornography even if they never had an interest in it before!
Second, with a lower level of chemical receptors for dopamine, not only do you not feel the same high while watching porn, but you get less enjoyment out every activity in your life. You don't feel as "alive" as you used to, as if you are living under a shroud.
You now only feel happy when watching porn.
Third, with the addiction laying so many new iFosB pathways, other pathways begin to shrink and disappear as they stop being used. Specifically, the frontal lobe starts to deteriorate. This is the area of the brain responsible for problem solving and decision making.
All serious addictions cause this deterioration....and porn is no different.
There is Always Hope
There is good news. That neuroplasticity of the brain, its ability to link previously unrelated things and lay new pathways, works both ways. Damage done to the brain can be reversed if you stop doing the unhealthy behavior.
However, it may be very difficult. It can take time to develop new pathways and erase old ones. And during that time, as with any addiction, you may go through the symptoms of withdrawals as your brain has gotten used to the high levels of dopamine.
ALso, their could be permanent consequences from your addiction that last rest of your life. If enough iFosB pathways accumulate it can “flip a genetic switch” causing the brain to be more susceptible to any addiction in the future.
So the best option is to never get addicted in the first place.
A Final Comparison Between Porn and Drugs
Describing porn’s effect to a U.S. Senate committee, Dr. Jeffrey Satinover of Princeton University said, “It is as though we have devised a form of heroin 100 times more powerful than before, usable in the privacy of one’s own home and injected directly to the brain through the eyes.”
Stay safe. Stay away from porn.
Keep pursuing (the wholesome)
Additional Materials
This post is part of a
mini-series on porn, get educated on all its effects.
