Rewards and Addictions

Serotonin levels are lower in people who are impulsive. Patients who attempt compulsive suicides and impulsive homicidal behavior, and those with severe early-onset alcoholism as well as bulimia, all have low levels of serotonin.(13) On the opposite side, we have also seen that patients who are obsessive (i.e., those who reflect excessively prior to performing a behavior which might be wrong) are characterized by high metabolic rates in their frontal areas of their brain and by high serotonergic measures.

Patients who attempt compulsive suicides and impulsive homicidal behavior, and those with severe early-onset alcoholism as well as bulimia, all have low levels of serotonin.

At this point, we can only guess that good mental health derives from the neurochemical balance between impulse and reflection systems. An individual with an excessively active dopaminergic reward system and an underactive serotonergic control system might be prone to excessive use of reinforcers which could have negative effects on health. Conversely, if one is characterized by low dopaminergic and high serotonergic function in the relevant areas of the brain, then excessive obsessing (sitting around and thinking about it endlessly) and too little action for the best possible function might be your pattern.

In the future, we may learn how to maximize the effect of talk therapy and drug interventions on these neurochemical systems. In the meantime, we can perhaps use this newly found knowledge to view addiction and impulsive behaviors with more enlightened compassion.