Quotes About Dopamine

Because my brain is broken. There's all sorts of interesting medical and neurochemical reasons for it, and I've learned everything I can about them,* but knowing all of that isn't enough to make my brain magically start processing serotonin and norepinephrine and dopamine in a balanced way

persistence is likely linked to high dopamine, so the higher the dopamine levels, the more you are likely to soldier on through adversity to achieve a particular goal.

When people have difficulty achieving regular releases of dopamine through these kinds of socially accepted activities, they will often seek a shortcut.

The moment of the print button for biology is nearing. Effectively, this could also mean that in a not-too-distant future, smart pharmacology will permit us to receive a continuous supply of antidepressants or neuroenhancers every time our dopamine level drops.

People are attracted more towards bad things because being good has been turned into a boring duty. No adrenaline & dopamine rush, no rewards!

Human sexual and social behavior shares some similaries with that of rodents, but has some important differences as well. It shows much greater variability and individuality, for example, and is less closely tied to the olfactory system. At present, it is tempting to speculate that those of us with cheatin' hearts might have differences in brain dopamine, vasopressin, or oxytocin signaling when compared to our more faithful friends who have adopted the prairie vole lifestyle.

On average, dopamine receptor density is reduced in the VTA target regions of obese subjects as compared with those lean subjects (a characteristic that can be measured in a brain scanner). But the key question remains: Do obese individuals show reduced dopaminergic activation of VTA target areas in response to food? Is a blunted pleasure response to food involved in obesity?

What if a chemical, either found in nature or cooked up in a lab, could tap into the motivational circuit and drive dopamine neurons artificially from within the brain? Intriguingly, this may be exactly how drugs of abuse work. Although different drugs of abuse have distinct molecular targets and very different behavioral effects, they all drive the electrical activity of dopamine neurons or the release of dopamine from these cells (while nonaddictive brain-targeted drugs like Prozac do not).5

Prolonged cocaine use, which diminishes dopamine functioning, gives support to the general rule that external sources of exuberance are ultimately overruled by the brain's inclination to seek out equilibrium.

Language, on the other hand, newer to the brain, may be more linked to those parts that regulate dopamine and thereby connected to pleasure.

New lovers tend to "lose their minds" and do all sorts of crazy things in the heat of the moment. One study showed that new lovers' brains have a lot in common with people on cocaine. Dopamine is sometimes called the "drug of desire." Too much dopamine, from being "high with excitement

Bring your dopamine or adrenaline level down by activating other regions of the brain other than the prefrontal cortex.

The main neurotransmitters that are active in the adolescent brain are norepinephrine, dopamine, and serotonin.

The world is beset by many problems, but in my opinion, this hijacking of our brain's reward centers by electronic media is potentially one of the most destructive.

Nothing captures the biological argument better than the famous New Age slogan: 'Happiness begins within.' Money, social status, plastic surgery, beautiful houses, powerful positions – none of these will bring you happiness. Lasting happiness comes only from serotonin, dopamine and oxytocin.

Money, social status, plastic surgery, beautiful houses, powerful positions – none of these will bring you happiness. Lasting happiness comes only from serotonin, dopamine and oxytocin.1

The science is clear. Social disconnection stimulates our brain's pain pathways and our stress response systems, making it more likely we'll seek out unhealthy sources of dopamine.

wanting and enjoyment are separate pathways in the brain, and the stronger wanting becomes, the weaker our enjoyment of life is.

Thus there's dopaminergic activation during schadenfreude—gloating over an envied person's fall from grace.

Lots of work has examined the genes involved, most broadly showing that variants that produce lowered dopamine signaling (less dopamine in the synapse, fewer dopamine receptors, or lower responsiveness of these receptors) are associated with sensation seeking, risk taking, attentional problems, and extroversion. Such individuals have to seek experiences of greater intensity to compensate for the blunted dopamine signaling.

Now we have hundreds of carefully engineered, designed, and marketed commercial foods filled with rapidly absorbed processed sugars that cause a burst of sensation that can't be matched by some lowly natural food. Once, we had lives that, amid considerable privation and negatives, also offered a huge array of subtle and often hard-won pleasures. And now we have drugs that cause spasms of pleasure and dopamine a thousand-fold higher than anything stimulated in our drug-free world.

the brain becomes literal when we do the flip side of empathy.10 It's painful watching a hated competitor succeed, and we activate the ACC at that time. Conversely, if he fails, we gloat, feel schadenfreude, get pleasure from his pain, and activate dopaminergic reward pathways. Forget "Your pain is my pain." Your pain is my gain.

dopamine is not about the happiness of reward. It's about the happiness of pursuit of reward that has a decent chance of occurring.

Brain-imaging studies of drug users at that stage show that viewing a film of actors pretending to use drugs activates dopamine pathways in the brain more than does watching porn films. This