Porn Addiction: Worse Than Cocaine?

Drugs and addiction are largely seen to go hand-in-hand. But what about behavioural addictions, how do they compare?

Behavioural addictions have remained largely unexplored, despite displaying very similar neural processes to substance addiction.

Cultural changes caused by technology are giving rise to various behavioural problems associated with internet use, such as porn addiction. As the way we interact with technology is becoming more immediate, it is also becoming increasingly addictive.

Why is internet pornography addictive?

The key reasons lay in it being accessible, affordable and anonymous.

It is well-established that the quicker the route of administration a drug has, the more addictive it is. Let’s take cocaine as an example. Chewing on coca leaves is a slow means of intoxication. It takes a long time for the drug to take effect as it is absorbed slowly through chewing. On the other hand, snorting cocaine is an almost instantaneous high — making it much more addictive.

Going back to internet pornography, accessing porn is a lot easier than it used to be. There is no need to leave your house to buy a magazine from the shop. Porn online is quick, easy and right at your fingertips. A quicker administration route makes it more addictive.

The internet delivers unending stimulation through activating our reward system, maintaining and heightening arousal from a simple click or finger swipe is cool and scary. This allows porn usage to be reinforced, activating the brain’s reward system easily with a quick method of delivery.

Does porn addiction change our brain?

Porn addiction damages our dopamine receptors in a very similar way that cocaine or other drugs of abuse would.

A well-established phenomenon in neuroscience is something called neuroplasticity. What this means is that our brains are not hardwired, but they change in response to our experiences. Simple.

Neuroplasticity is particularly relevant to addictive behaviours. Think of addiction as a learnt behaviour. Our brain accommodates to the behaviours we repeatedly perform.

We see very similar changes to the brain’s reward centre for porn addiction, just like any other drug addiction. The driver of this change is dopamine. That feel good rush we get from doing something rewarding? Yup, that’s it.

Of course, drugs of abuse trigger dopamine secretion too. The only difference is there isn’t any goal being accomplished, the drug mimics this activity though — making us feel good regardless. Overtime, this damages the reward system.

Porn addiction also alters that reward centre, leading addicted individuals to compulsively seek out porn in order for dopamine to be released.

Dopamine is secreted during sexual excitement and novelty, both of which occur when watching porn. However, the natural goal accomplishment of actually having sex isn’t there.

Brain imaging studies find strong similarities between porn and drug addicts, suggesting the chemical basis is similar.

What are the societal implications of porn addiction?

Although scientific data is still lacking in this field, internet porn addiction comes with a significant level of psychosocial dysfunction. In certain ways, porn addiction might be seen as less socially acceptable than a drug addiction.

Drug use (yes, including alcohol) has a kind of language that surrounds the stories we tell. It’s socially acceptable and entertaining to tell stories about that time we got “super f***ed up” and did something funny.

Although addiction is a largely socially unacceptable thing, psychoactive substances are largely accepted in society — partly because so many of us use them!

Porn addiction doesn’t have that same kind of social understanding and story-telling aspect. Perhaps this makes it more socially isolating.

Looking at the wider picture, we are living through an internet epidemic. Social media and the online world successfully target our brain’s reward system just like any drug.

How do we escape it? Well, that’s the problem. Many of us are trapped in an online world which is increasingly more difficult to get away from. Tuning out and turning off is getting a lot harder.

The immediate accessibility of everything online means we get that dopamine reward quicker and easier. The quicker a drug takes effect, the more addictive it is — making the internet the perfect drug delivery mechanism. So, is internet porn addiction worse than cocaine? Perhaps not health-wise but socially? Maybe.