Most of us assume that what we think and
do is totally normal. All women lie to their
husbands about chocolate and shoes, right?
Unless we’re in pain or suffering other
aversive symptoms, there’s rarely a reason
to question our routines – which means
that habits have carte blanche to escalate
into destructive crutches and, worse,
addiction. Often it’s not until we try to stop
shopping or gorging or Instagramming that
we realise the grip our vices have.
According to mental health bible the
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of
Mental Disorders (DSM), which refers to
an addiction as a ‘dependency’, hallmarks of
unhealthy reliance include maintaining the
behaviour despite negative consequences in
a personal, social or work context.
The obfuscating factor in detecting
everyday addictions is that they’re
generally sanctioned by cultural values
and, in moderation, are benign. According
to Adelaide drug and alcohol abuse
counsellor Alisha Hughes, the arbiter of
a habit’s healthfulness is whether you feel
you’re making an active choice to engage
in a behaviour. “In most cases, individuals
who are dealing with addiction don’t
have control over what they are doing,
taking or using,” Hughes says. “They
become dependent on it to cope with
daily life.” And since dependency relies on
conditioning your brain’s reward centre
to anticipate a stimulus – think Pavlov’s
dog – virtually anything can be addictive.
Painklllers, food, exercise, sex, the Internet
and even coffee can qualify (one study even
suggested that cheese was addictive).
“Eating activates the reward system in
our brain in the same way that some other
substances, such as drugs, do,” says Sarah
McMahon, psychologist and body image
expert at Sydney’s BodyMatters. “So many
people who use eating as a form of coping
either never develop the capacity to deal
with distressing emotions, or simply lose
these skills. As a result, eating increasingly
becomes the coping strategy of choice.”
According to McMahon, when the
reward system in the brain is activated, it
releases feelgood neurotransmitters and
files the experience under a kind of brain
favourites menu for ready access next
time. “Dopamine-containing neurons are
sent around the brain and this experience
is pleasurable and makes us want to eat
again,” McMahon says. “This is why you
may feel your mood actually change after
you down half a block of chocolate or a
mega cup of hot chips and why you want
more even if you’re not hungry.” We each
have a different dopamine profile. “We all
have different sensitivities to the dopamine
reward pathway,” McMahon says. Highly
processed food with high sugar and fat
content elicits a more powerful dopamine
response than wholefoods, McMahon says.
The physiology is the same for other vices.
The intricate web of factors that makes
us repeat unhelpful behaviours makes
breaking the cycle complex. The interplay
of processes makes accessing the root of
addictive behaviours a bit like withdrawing
funds from a linked savings account via
a transaction account – you need to use
the behaviour as a means to get to the
source. While changing a habit requires
directly addressing anomalous behaviour
and scrutinising it for triggers, it also
demands learning problem-solving skills
and possibly discovering other sources of
relaxation or pleasure.