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> The crucial point is it is characterised by neurological changes that lead to short circuited reward pathways Everything that's enjoyable in life can meet th
by nearbuy 3y ago
> The crucial point is it is characterised by neurological changes that lead to short circuited reward pathways
Everything that's enjoyable in life can meet that definition. For practical purposes, we only consider severe cases to be addiction, but it's not well-defined. The article you linked says:
> However, there is no agreement on the exact definition of addiction in medicine. Indeed, Volkow et al. (2016) report that the DSM-5 defines addictions as the most severe degree of the addictive disorders, due to pervasive/excessive substance-use or behavioural compulsions/impulses. It is a definition that many scientific papers and reports use.
> The DSM-5 and ICD-10 only recognize gambling addictions as behavioral addictions
I don't think the DSM-5 has any principled reason for recognizing gambling addictions but not video game addiction or shopping addiction, other than gambling addiction being particularly harmful.
- hgomersall 3y agoThe critical sentence in the Wikipedia intro is "despite substantial harm and other negative consequences".
- nearbuy 3y agoYeah, which I think fits perfectly with jimz description that you were replying to. Whether social media is beneficial or causing substantial harm is not well defined or easily measured. It's a subjective thing that will be debated and rely on judgement.
- hgomersall 3y agoI'm not sure it's as difficult as you suggest. It's generally a subjective assessment of the individual concerned: is this thing that I feel compelled to do causing me significant harm? There's no need to attach rigorous measure or external validation to that. That's part of why it can be contentious; people can declare themselves addicted but one suspects they sometimes do it to avert blame for some related action.