Addiction + Exercise
Find below a section from my research paper entitled: Exercise-induced Neuroadaptations in Receptor Expression that Predispose to Addiction. It was written under the guidance of Michael Buccigrossi, Dr.P.H., Visiting Assistant Professor of Psychology at Colby College. This paper was condensed and presented at the Drexel Immune Modulation and Engineering Symposium in December of 2022 and the Northeast Bioengineering Conference in March 2023. It was presented and published at the International Young Researchers' Conference in Tokyo, Japan in June 2023. Another version was presented and published at the International Conference on Bioengineering and Biotechnology in London, United Kingdom in August 2023 as a part of the of the 9th World Congress on New Technologies.
Introduction:
The neuroscience of addiction is complex and involves a variety of responses. Addiction is a chronic, relapsing disorder that involves compulsive seeking of a stimulant to feel euphoria, despite the adverse consequences. Addiction involves functional changes to brain circuits that are involved with reward, stress, and self-control (NIDA, 2020). Anybody can fall into the trap of addiction, even elite athletes. According to the World Anti-Doping Agency, almost half of the athletes who took part in the 2011 World Championships in Athletics admitted to using banned substances (Ulrich et al., 2017). This paper addresses certain neuroadaptations in the striatum of the brain that renders elite athletes more vulnerable to addictive behavior, particularly as a result of an increased tolerance to dopamine. Constant post-exercise increases in dopamine leads to tolerance and an elongated stress response, leading athletes to seek additional stimulation through risk-taking. Risk-taking behavior often includes the use and abuse of addictive substances.
