By Keith Sellick
About 10 years ago I had a very understanding employer: came in late, and
worked late, sometimes being the last to leave (they were that trusting).
One evening I finished a job at about 10pm and then started playing on the
computer Sid Meier’s Civilization. I was still playing when the rest of the
staff arrived in the morning.
I only did it once but Am I Normal looked at people who play computer games
all night, every night with Presenter Dr Tanya Byron exploring whether this
behaviour was an addiction.
Excess is a historical phenomenum; drunks and overeaters were disparaged in
Ancient Greek and Hogarth portrayed his Gin Alley. Before the rise of the
brain sciences such problems were usually seen as a question of moral
weakness.
Am I Normal featured a US doctor who believed addiction was a lifestyle
choice and addicts needed to be told to stop. Other scientists examined at
how drugs affected the chemicals in the brain such as dopamine making
addiction a real physiological problem resulting in powerlessness and the
feeling that one’s live is being overwhelmed by the need for a fix.
Sometimes it wasn’t even the fix itself that sparked the physical reaction
but the expectation.
More recently we have had the rise of the “modern” addictions: gambling, sex
and computer gaming. Even reading Harry Potter books has been linked to
addiction, see my colleagues Natalie Valios’s blog
The programme showed how a near-fix can deliver a feeling of physical well
being; for example slot machines are built to provide near miss wins, which
provide as much pleasure for the addict as an outright win and keeps them
gambling. A sex therapist spoke about how clients would cruise for
prostitutes for hours without actually having sex.
Then there were the strange theories to combat addiction: rapid eye
movements, forcefields, hypnotism and so on. In Amsterdam, there is a centre
treating people for computer games addiction (cost £2,500).
Are these really addictions or just bad habits and peer pressure? The
behaviour may look like an addiction but without the chemical dependency I
am dubious,
The “it’s a moral problem” doctor came up with the fact that 87 per cent of
US soldiers addicted to heroin in Vietnam gave up on returning home. Why?
Because he said they no longer needed it to cope. It was not so much the
therapy, even the strange ones, that helped people quit but people deciding
they no longer needed the drug.
Another doctor of the “addiction is a physical problem” agreed that most
people gave up addictions without any help.
Which implies that people are not helpless in the face of addiction and can
choose to quit. But that poses the question, which the programme did not
ask, why are people’s lives so bad that they give themselves up to drugs,
drink or gambling?
Practitioners in social services see people present with alcohol or drug
problems. So what do you think?
The programme can be watched at http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer
Leave a comment