Talk

How To Reset Your Brain's Dopamine Balance — Dr Anna Lembke (Modern Wisdom #392)

Nov 2021 🇺🇸 🇬🇧 Modern Wisdom (host Chris Williamson)

Stanford addiction psychiatrist Anna Lembke explains to host Chris Williamson her clinical model of the brain's pleasure-and-pain balance: intense or frequent stimulation is followed by a dip below baseline mood, which she says drives cravings for more of the same stimulation. She describes smartphones, social feeds, and other constantly available, low-effort sources of stimulation as being associated with this craving-and-relief pattern, alongside processed food and other everyday conveniences. Lembke recommends that children be kept off personal devices until roughly age 12 to 13 so they can build other coping skills first, and outlines a 30-day abstinence period as one way adults can reset their own baseline mood. TechKids Foundation includes this as a substantive, general-audience articulation of her addiction-medicine framework applied to everyday screen habits.

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CITATION

Williamson, Chris, host. "How To Reset Your Brain's Dopamine Balance – Dr Anna Lembke." Modern Wisdom, episode 392, November 1, 2021.

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