Five most common addictive personality traits
- addictionfrontline
- Dec 18, 2014
- 3 min read
Addiction creates textbook personality trademarks. The disease of addiction refers to alterations within the prefrontal cortex, morphing motivational, memory and behavioral functions. Alterations begin around the adolescent years. These neurological changes can produce a range of personality quirks - even years into recovery.
The disease is the drug. Contrary to popular belief, drugs do not cause these alternations - however drug exposure worsens the rewiring. A person carrying the disease might never touch a drug throughout his or her lifetime, however the disease will likely manifest through other behaviors: gambling, hoarding, eating, starving, sex, working compulsive overtime or videogames.
Addicts, regardless of addiction, tend to share common personality traits emanating from the neurological alterations. Think deeper into the personalities of your acquaintances or colleagues the next time someone’s quirky knee-jerk action renders you perplexed.
1. Compulsiveness
Addiction often manifests through compulsion behavior. Pulling a drug addict away from cocaine proves about difficult as pulling a video game addict away from “Call of Duty.” An intervention deems necessary if the person willingly misses several work days, stops eating and empties the bank account to continue usage. Even after recovery, individuals must stay constantly aware of seemingly mundane actions triggering compulsive behaviors.
2. Risky behavior
Betting the mortgage appears perfectly logical to a gambleholic at the craps table. Studies show the anterior cingulate regulates emotionally arousing situations within non-addict brains, yet appears to have a delayed response within addict brains. Instead, emotionally arousing situations activate the insula within the addict brain. Without anterior cingulate regulation, people with addiction tend to feel comfortable with risky situations: sex with multiple partners, driving 100 m.p.h. after smoking PCP, investing every penny into a soaring stock, unusual sexual behaviors or starting a fight over the last sesame seed bagel at the coffee house.
3. Self-centeredness
People with addiction frequently demonstrate narcissistic tendencies, even with several years of clean time. “The world revolves around me” appears logical. The self-centered hardwiring often causes the addict to forget other people feel emotions. Non-addicts often mistake this behavior for ill manners. Basically, the addict brain is addicted to its own ego, causing unawareness about the value of others. Habitual reminding oneself to consider others easily remedies this mode of thinking.
4. Impulsivity
Spontaneous, bad decisions seem like great ideas to the addict brain. The concept is not “jump before you think.” The concept is simply “jump.” Studies show the addict brain possesses an abnormally low level of D2 receptors, a speed bump for dopamine. Non addict brains possess enough D2 receptors to regulate dopamine – a brake check on impulsivity. Without a healthy level of D2 receptors, dopamine circulates through the open toll D1 receptors. Basically, no parents are home to supervise the party. The inability to control one’s impulses causes a person with addiction to inhale two grams of cocaine, five Valiums, a jar of PCP, 10 shots and a bottle of hot sauce straight from the Yucatan Peninsula. After recovery, the same person might loss a job because he or she forgets to check for the boss before blurting out an insult.
5. Intelligence
Recent studies show leaders and innovators thrive off addiction brain functions: novelty seeking behavior for the sake of dopamine release. The same risky behavior driving cocaine addicts to near-death also drives CEOs to steer companies in bold new paths. An engineer with addiction gains a dopamine boost with every new design patent, driving his mind to design more patents and release more dopamine. Why? Because these innovators and leaders possess a low level of D2 receptors and a high level of D4 receptors. They need their dopamine fix.
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