dopamine is often misunderstood as merely providing quick "hits" of pleasure. In reality, the body maintains a baseline level of dopamine that plays a crucial role in influencing mood and motivation. Exciting or pleasurable experiences can cause dopamine peaks, but these are followed by a drop in the baseline level, which can lead to decreased motivation and mood. Continuous pursuit of high dopamine peaks, especially through addictive behaviors, can deplete dopamine levels, leading to addiction and a diminished capacity for enjoyment in other areas of life.

The video explains how dopamine functions as a "currency" for tracking pleasure, success, and performance. It is a key determinant of an individual's drive and motivation, and its levels are relative to recent experiences. The repeated engagement in pleasurable activities raises the threshold for enjoyment, necessitating ever-greater stimulation for satisfaction. Activities such as social media, pornography, and video games, which manipulate dopamine levels, can impair real-world interactions and lead to serious addiction issues.

Main takeaways from the video:

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Key Vocabularies and Common Phrases:

1. dopamine [ˈdoʊpəˌmiːn] - (n.) - A neurotransmitter that plays a major role in reward-motivated behavior. - Synonyms: (neurotransmitter, biochemical, brain chemical)

So let's talk about dopamine. Most people have heard of dopamine, and we hear all the time now about dopamine hits, but actually there's no such thing as a dopamine hit.

2. baseline [ˈbeɪslaɪn] - (n.) - A standard or reference point for comparison. - Synonyms: (reference point, standard, criterion)

And actually, the way that your body uses dopamine is to have a baseline level of dopamine, meaning an amount of dopamine that's circulating in your brain and body all the time.

3. addiction [əˈdɪkʃən] - (n.) - The fact or condition of being dependent on a particular substance or activity. - Synonyms: (dependency, habituation, compulsion)

Many people do, however, and that's what we call addiction.

4. depletion [dɪˈpliːʃən] - (n.) - Reduction in the number or quantity of something. - Synonyms: (exhaustion, reduction, diminishment)

And now you understand that afterward the baseline of dopamine drops because of depletion of dopamine, the readily releasable pool, the dopamine, is literally not around to be released

5. currency [ˈkɜːrənsi] - (n.) - A system of money or something that is generally used for exchange. - Synonyms: (medium of exchange, denomination, money)

This is really important dopamine is a currency, and it's the way that you track pleasure, it's the way that you track success, it's the way that you track whether or not you are doing well or doing poorly.

6. neurobiological [nʊroʊˌbaɪəˈlɒdʒɪkl] - (adj.) - Related to the biology of the nervous system. - Synonyms: (neurological, neuronal, cerebral)

The discussion is happening now. The underlying neurobiological mechanisms you now understand.

7. universal [ˌjuːnɪˈvɜːrsl] - (adj.) - Affecting, done by, or involving all things or people in the world or in a particular group; applicable everywhere or in all cases. - Synonyms: (global, worldwide, all-encompassing)

dopamine is a universal currency in all mammals, but especially in humans, for moving us toward goals.

8. intensity [ɪnˈtɛnsɪti] - (n.) - The quality of being intense, especially in terms of strength or force. - Synonyms: (strength, force, power)

Now that you understand how your previous level of dopamine relates to your current level of dopamine, and how your current level of dopamine will influence your future level of dopamine, it should become obvious why things like pornography, not just the accessibility of pornography, but the intensity of pornography, can negatively shape real world romantic and sexual interactions.

9. romantic [roʊˈmæntɪk] - (adj.) - Conducive to or characterized by the expression of love. - Synonyms: (passionate, amorous, ardent)

Now that you understand how your previous level of dopamine relates to your current level of dopamine, and how your current level of dopamine will influence your future level of dopamine, it should become obvious why things like pornography, not just the accessibility of pornography, but the intensity of pornography, can negatively shape real world romantic and sexual interactions

10. mechanism [ˈmekənɪzəm] - (n.) - A natural or established process by which something takes place or is brought about. - Synonyms: (process, procedure, method)

You now understand the mechanisms behind what I'm telling you.

How to Quit Video Game, Pornography & Social Media Addiction - Dr. Andrew Huberman

So let's talk about dopamine. Most people have heard of dopamine, and we hear all the time now about dopamine hits, but actually there's no such thing as a dopamine hit. And actually, the way that your body uses dopamine is to have a baseline level of dopamine, meaning an amount of dopamine that's circulating in your brain and body all the time. And that turns out to be important for how you feel generally, whether or not you're in a good mood, motivated, et cetera. And you also can experience peaks in dopamine above baseline. But if you remember nothing else from this episode, please remember this, that when you experience something, or you crave something really desirable, really exciting to you, very pleasurable, what happens afterwards is your baseline level of dopamine drops.

These peaks in dopamine, they influence how much dopamine will generally be circulating afterward. And you might think, oh, a big peak in dopamine after that, I'm gonna feel even better because I just had this great event. Not the case. What actually happens is that your baseline level of dopamine drops. Fortunately, most people do not experience or pursue enormous increases in dopamine leading to these severe drops in baseline. Many people do, however, and that's what we call addiction. When somebody pursues a drug or an activity that leads to huge increases in dopamine. And now you understand that afterward the baseline of dopamine drops because of depletion of dopamine, the readily releasable pool, the dopamine, is literally not around to be released. And so people feel pretty lousy. And many people make the mistake of then going and pursuing the dopamine, evoking the dopamine releasing activity or substance again, thinking mistakenly that it's going to bring up their baseline, it's going to give them that peak again. Not only does it not give them a peak, their baseline gets lower and lower because they're depleting dopamine more and more and more. And we've seen this over and over again. When people get addicted to something, then they're not achieving much pleasure at all.

dopamine is a universal currency in all mammals, but especially in humans, for moving us toward goals and how much dopamine is in our system at any one time compared to how much dopamine was in our system a few minutes ago, and how much we remember enjoying a particular experience of the past that dictates your so-called quality of life and your desire to pursue things. This is really important, dopamine is a currency, and it's the way that you track pleasure, it's the way that you track success, it's the way that you track whether or not you are doing well or doing poorly. And that is subjective. But if your dopamine is too low, you will not feel motivated. If your dopamine is really high, you will feel motivated. And if your dopamine is somewhere in the middle, how you feel depends on whether or not you had high, higher dopamine a few minutes ago or lower dopamine.

This is important. Your experience of life and your level of motivation and drive depends on how much dopamine you have relative to your recent experience. This is, again, something that's just not accounted for in the simple language of dopamine hits. Okay, a simple way to envision dopamine hits is every time you do something you like, eat a piece of chocolate, dopamine hit, you look at your Instagram, dopamine hit, you see someone like dopamine hit. All these things described as dopamine hits neglect the fact that if you scroll social media and you see something you really like, dopamine hit. Sure, there's an increase in dopamine, but then you get to something else and you go, not that interesting. However, had you arrived at that second thing first, you might think that it was really interesting. If you had arrived to that second Instagram post three days later or four days later, you might find it extremely interesting. Again, how much dopamine you experience from something depends on your baseline level of dopamine. When you arrive there and your previous dopamine peaks.

Okay, that's super important to understand, and it's completely neglected by the general language of dopamine hits. This is why when you repeatedly engage in something that you enjoy, your threshold for enjoyment goes up and up and up. dopamine is this universal currency. It establishes value based on not just what you're experiencing in the moment, but what you experienced in the days and minutes before. Now that you understand how your previous level of dopamine relates to your current level of dopamine, and how your current level of dopamine will influence your future level of dopamine, it should become obvious why things like pornography, not just the accessibility of pornography, but the intensity of pornography, can negatively shape real world romantic and sexual interactions.

This is a serious concern. The discussion is happening now. The underlying neurobiological mechanisms you now understand. And this isn't to pass judgment on whether or not people like or don't like pornography. That's an ethical discussion and it's a moral discussion that has to be decided for each individual by virtue of age, etc. But again, any activity that evokes a lot of dopamine release will make it harder to achieve the same level and certainly the greater level of dopamine through a subsequent interaction. So yes, indeed, many people are addicted to pornography. And yes indeed, many people who regularly indulge in pornography experience challenges in real world romantic interactions. You now understand the mechanisms behind what I'm telling you. You can even see this with video games. People will play a video game, they love it, it's super exciting to them. And then they'll keep playing and playing and playing, and either one of two things happens, typically both.

First of all, I always say addiction is a progressive narrowing of the things that bring you pleasure. So oftentimes what will happen is the person only has excitement and can achieve dopamine release to the same extent doing that behavior and not other behaviors. And so they start losing interest in school, they start losing interest in relationships, they start losing interest in fitness and well-being and depletes their life. And eventually what typically happens is they will stop getting dopamine release from that activity as well. And then they drop into a pretty serious depression and this can get very severe and people have committed suicide from these sorts of patterns of activity.

Just very briefly, because it was also covered in the interview episode I did with Anna Lembke about addiction. Some of you might be asking, what should I do if I experience a drop in my baseline level of dopamine because of engagement with some activity or some substance that led to big peaks? Just to put some color and example on this, a few episodes ago I talked about a friend who I've known a long time. This is actually the child of a friend who has basically become addicted to video games. He decided actually after seeing that episode with Anna, to do a 30-day complete fast from phone, from video games, and from social media of all kinds. He's now at day 29, he's really accomplished this.

Not incidentally, his levels of concentration, his overall mood are up. He's doing far, far better. What he did is hard. In particular, the first 14 days is really hard. But the way that you replenish the releasable pool of dopamine is to not engage in these dopaminergic seeking behaviors. Because remember, typically people arrive at a place where they want to stop engaging in these behaviors or ingesting substances when that dopamine is depleted, when they're not getting the same lift. In his case, he was feeling depressed, he thought he had adhd. They were starting to treat it as ADHD. And certainly there are people out there who have ADHD. But what he found was that his levels of concentration are back. He does not need to be treated for ADHD. And actually, the psychiatrist wondered if he did prior to this video game, social media, fast. He's feeling good, he's exercising again. I'm not making this up. This is really a very specific but very relevant example of how the dopamine system can replenish itself.

Of course, if there's a clinical need for ADHD treatment, by all means pursue that. But I think a lot of ADHD does go misdiagnosed because of this depletion in dopamine that occurs because of overindulgence and other activities and the drop in baseline. So for anyone that's experienced a real drop in baseline who has addictive tendencies, whether or not they're behaviors or substances, that is always going to be the path forward is going to be either cold turkey or through some sort of tapering to limit interactions with the what would otherwise be the dopamine evoking behavior or substance. So if I were to just put a really simple message around dopamine, it would be there's a molecule in your brain and body that, when released, tends to make you look outside yourself, pursue things outside yourself, and to crave things outside yourself. The pleasure that arrives from achieving things also involves dopamine, but is mainly the consequence of other molecules.

SCIENCE, EDUCATION, TECHNOLOGY, DOPAMINE, ADDICTION, HUMAN BEHAVIOR, HUBERMAN LAB CLIPS