Anastasia Egorova
Behavioral Addiction. The Illusion of Freedom

– I think you need to see a doctor; you have an addiction to the computer.

– Darling, it's not an addiction, it's my job!

From a real-life story

Introduction

I suggest an experiment.

Before you read this book, put away your phone and laptop, and see how long you can last without a mobile device and the internet.

If you managed to go for more than twenty-four hours without a mobile device and the World Wide Web, and you had no desire to pick up your phone to check social networks and messaging apps – you are fine.

If you thought about your phone and social networks a few times, you may have some degree of addiction to social media and the internet, but you can overcome it on your own.

If you put away your phone and are experiencing irritability, aggression, and are trying to switch to alcohol, drugs, exercise, or if you are stress-eating with sweets – you are addicted, and you need to seek professional help.

If you cannot put your phone away and are certain that there is no life outside the internet, or that it is dull and dreary, congratulations: you have truly serious issues with a behavioral addiction, and you must take action because you will not overcome it on your own.

One of the paradoxical aspects of behavioral addictions is that they are often perceived by individuals as an expression of their personal freedom. A person believes that they themselves choose how much time to spend on the computer, what purchases to make, or how intensively to work. However, in reality, these actions become compulsive and uncontrollable, leading to a loss of true freedom of choice.

Furthermore, behavioral addictions can create a false sense of control over one's life. For example, a person suffering from compulsive shopping may think that buying a new item will help them cope with stress or improve their mood. In reality, this provides only temporary relief, after which the problem returns with renewed intensity.

Behavioral addictions pose a serious threat to an individual's mental and physical health. They create an illusion of freedom, which is in fact a form of enslavement. Addressing this problem requires comprehensive measures, including both individual work with psychologists and changes in the social environment. Only in this way can genuine freedom and control over one's life be restored.

The concept of behavioral addiction is one of the most pressing issues in modern psychology and sociology. In the context of rapid technological development and the expansion of the information environment, behavioral addictions are becoming increasingly widespread.

The purpose of this book is to analyze the phenomenon of modern behavioral addictions. A behavioral addiction, much like a substance use disorder, is associated with a loss of self-control. This addiction consists of irresistible cravings and the motivation to experience intense positive emotions. And who among us does not enjoy positive emotions?

People are dependent on many things that seem natural to them. For instance, we enjoy scrolling through pictures and short entertaining videos on our gadgets, chatting in messengers, engaging in sports for pleasure, eating sweets or oranges, or watching several episodes of a favorite series in a row. It is difficult for modern individuals to give up various harmful, or not-so-harmful, habits. Any addiction is driven by the goal of obtaining immediate pleasure, a short-term reward. But we all know that for such a short-term reward, a person ultimately incurs long-term costs and negative consequences.

Addiction is a destructive form of behavior that develops when a person attempts to escape reality, striving to avoid interaction with an unpleasant situation or period in life by altering their mental state.

The Russian psychiatrist A. O. Bukhanovsky defines addictive behavior as a chronic mental disorder, representing a deformation and pathological development of the personality. At the same time, Bukhanovsky notes that the motives for committing the actions are not amenable to rational analysis in the moment, often causing pain and harm to the addicted individual and their family. The harm resulting from the addiction can be of various kinds: medical, psychological, material, and often even legal.

V. D. Mendelevich, an author of scientific works in the field of clinical psychology and psychiatry, believes that classical Russian addiction medicine is based on an erroneous paradigm of the psychological pathologization of substance use disorders. Meanwhile, the definition of "addictive craving" is currently considered acceptable from a scientific standpoint for both chemical and non-chemical dependencies.

V. D. Mendelevich notes that the primary diagnostic criterion for a dependency, whether chemical or non-chemical in nature, is the presence of an altered state of consciousness. It is well known that chemical dependency is based on the use of psychoactive substances. However, a non-chemical dependency is defined as one based not on the use of a psychoactive substance, but on a specific behavioral pattern – a particular stereotype of behavior that negatively affects the quality of life. Although non-chemical dependencies are outside the focus of attention for psychiatrists and addiction specialists in our country, they not only exist theoretically in textbooks but are also frequently encountered in the practice of clinical psychologists.

A behavioral addiction may be less severe in its consequences for physical health, but financially, socially, and psychologically, an individual can suffer greatly from it. Such dependencies often occur within family dynamics. The family is one of the primary factors in the development of behavioral addictions, which is why family psychotherapy is often the optimal choice in practice for working with such disorders.

In 2015, T. Robins and L. Clark wrote in their research that chemical and behavioral addictions share common biological mechanisms. Such a statement implies that some behavioral addictions may respond to therapeutic interventions used in the treatment of chemical dependencies.

A behavioral addiction is characterized by a rapid reward, long-term physical costs, and substantial risks of various kinds. For example, an individual may resort to watching a specific type of video content to reduce feelings of anxiety, irritation, or melancholy, thereby providing themselves with short-term euphoria. A crucial role in behavioral addictions is played by a lack of emotional regulation skills, which could otherwise correct a person's behavior and direct their actions into more beneficial channels for themselves. People suffering from gambling disorder, compulsive shopping, or eating addictions notice that their level of positive emotions diminishes over time. When they repeat the same pleasure-inducing action, the novelty effect disappears.

Due to the diminishing intensity of positive emotions, a person with an addiction requires not just a repetition of the same actions, but also an increase in energy expenditure to achieve the desired emotional effect. For instance, when viewing a specific type of video content, men notice that after some time, they cease to derive pleasure from the same video. The absence of a positive effect not only prompts them to endless internet surfing but also drives them to seek out content that is socially unacceptable.

How is normality distinguished from abnormality today?

Imagine you are observing a colony of emperor penguins. They are all large, sleek, black, and beautiful, with yellow feathers above their eyes that you would call "fabulous eyebrows" if penguins were human. Then, among this uniform colony, a small, completely white, awkward albino penguin comes into focus, and you catch yourself thinking: "Oh, this shouldn't be. This is completely unacceptable from the standpoint of the standard beauty of emperor penguins!"

Well, today's norm is the standard accepted by the majority of people, by the entire society. Pornography addiction, for example, is not entirely normal today. An individual can have many other addictive behavioral conditions; however, the problem of pornography addiction is currently addressed by very few. Men suffering from this behavioral addiction, while attempting to rid themselves of systematically viewing pornography during the psychotherapeutic process, note that if they are forced to abstain from viewing such content under the principle of "quitting cold turkey and never watching those terrible videos again," they subsequently describe experiencing a state resembling withdrawal syndrome after discontinuing the use of psychoactive substances. However, this kind of withdrawal does not have serious medical consequences.

During the withdrawal syndrome in a behavioral addiction, symptoms of a hypertensive crisis are entirely absent, and, incidentally, there are no significant physiological changes. However, if one abruptly decides to quit video games, internet surfing, or excessive gadget use, they experience not only a depressed state but also aggression, rage, and irritability, which can be difficult to control.

The formation of any addiction involves the neurotransmitter systems of our body. I will mention them very briefly so as not to weary the reader. The leading roles here are played by serotonin, which is responsible for behavioral inhibition, and dopamine, responsible for the reward system, motivation, learning, and assessing the significance of a stimulus. The dopaminergic system plays a key role in the formation of a behavioral addiction.

Neurobiological studies have identified impaired functioning of the prefrontal cortex in individuals prone to both chemical and behavioral addictions. The prefrontal cortex determines the impulsivity of actions and is responsible for inhibition. In addition to the prefrontal cortex, the amygdala and the mesocorticolimbic system become activated during engagement in activities such as gambling, buying lottery tickets, internet surfing, and playing computer games. The constant activation of these brain areas and the suppression of the prefrontal cortex firmly reinforce specific addictive behavioral patterns in an individual; this is how a behavioral addiction is formed.

The use of psychoactive substances or involvement in a behavioral addiction can be the consequence of the same underlying process that provokes such behavior. For example, constant family conflicts, arguments, problems at work, and being in a stressful situation – coupled with a lack of self-regulation skills and stress resilience – create fertile ground for the development of both alcoholism and drug addiction, as well as for the formation of behavioral addictions. Certainly, hereditary factors also play a role here. Thus, if first – degree relatives (parents) had a dependency on drugs or alcohol, then under certain conditions their offspring may also have a propensity for drug or alcohol use, or a propensity for gambling disorder, kleptomania, internet addiction, or pornography addiction.

V. D. Mendelevich classifies religious and political fanaticism, as well as sports fanaticism, as forms of addictive behavior. He emphasizes that any aspect of human activity, when pursued with excessive passion, ultimately causes harm to the individual and their loved ones.

Today, researchers have developed several classifications of behavioral addictions. Let us present one of them. A. V. Kotlyarov proposes that the following phenomena be considered addictions:

– appearance addiction (a fanatical desire to frequently visit cosmetologists, a striving for the ideal appearance promoted by social media trends);

– ideology addiction (religious fanaticism, sects, astrology, palmistry, esoteric movements);

– existential addiction: a constant search for the meaning of life and a tendency towards exaggerated philosophizing about the meaning of existence, coupled with neglect of other life spheres (addiction to psychotherapy with metaphysical intoxication);

– sexual addiction (frequent change of sexual partners, promiscuity, nymphomania, pornography addiction, and addiction to being in love);

– addiction to solitude and a constant need for loneliness, which has a negative impact on a person's quality of life;

– codependent relationships;

– computer addictions: gaming addiction, internet surfing, criminal programming (an urge for hacking);

– addiction to mass media, to watching television, viewing advertisements and social media videos, and binge-watching series;

– economic dependency (addiction to money and its social hierarchy, an overvaluation of material and financial means);

– gambling addiction (gambling);

– workaholism and work as a fixed idea;

– shopping addiction and compulsive buying on marketplaces and online;

– gadget dependency (excessive use of smart gadgets in daily life, such as phones);

– victimhood dependency: masochism, Stockholm syndrome, aggressive behavior such as sadism, a perpetual war syndrome, constant blackmail;

– other dependencies: scribomania, urgency addiction (expressed as a constant feeling of time shortage), binge reading, Merry Driving Syndrome, sports addiction.

Not all behavioral addictions are listed in this book, but some of them are included in the multiaxial classification of diseases and accompany more severe mental disorders, such as schizophrenia.

The formation of behavioral addictions results from a specific set of factors: these include not only family upbringing and social environment but also the broader cultural and national milieu, encompassing the mentality of the individual and the entire ethnic group to which the person belongs. Theoretical and empirical data revealing the nature of behavioral addictions remain limited to this day, a fact which prevents the inclusion of all forms of these dependencies in modern classifications of mental disorders. The lack of substantial research fuels debate in medicine, biology, and psychology: should behavioral addiction even be considered a disorder, rather than an individual's lifestyle choice?

The question of medical support in treating behavioral addictions, unfortunately, remains open in domestic psychiatry due to insufficient study of the phenomenon. Equally relevant today is the issue of behavioral addiction among children and adolescents. There is no shortage of means that can lead to behavioral addictions, ranging from gadgets, messengers, and computer games to internet surfing.

An analysis of research on adolescent and child behavior in the practice of psychotherapy and clinical psychology establishes the significance of computer games as a dominant activity for primary school children and teenagers. At a certain point in a child's or adolescent's life, educational activities, hobbies, peer communication, literature, and ordinary outdoor activities are imperceptibly displaced by computer games.

The personality of an adolescent who "lives" in the world of computer games exhibits a high degree of emotional and mental immaturity. Because of this infantilism, such a teenager lacks independence in everyday situations, has weak friendship bonds in the real world, and seldom goes outside. Internet technologies are constantly evolving, and modern society cannot eliminate them from daily life. Strict restrictions and manipulative behavior from adults based on the principle, "If you don't do your homework, I will take away your phone," are ineffective. Modern information technologies play an important role in our lives, having secured a firm place in commercial, communicative, industrial, and cultural spheres of activity.

Through immersion in the world of information technology, sports, or work, people try to escape their difficulties. For a modern teenager – shy, fragile, unable to defend their point of view among friends and classmates, and suffering from a lack of attention at home – "escaping" into a computer game or watching online video content is a way to mitigate negative emotions and sensations from real life. Choosing a positive, highly "leveled-up" computer hero can also be a form of compensation for the adolescent's own self-rejection. The reward system in computer games also works in a treacherous manner; what a child cannot achieve in real life – the ability to "earn bonuses" in studies, relationships, or other hobbies – is obtained within the computer game.

This is a way to feel significant, like a superhero. While for a child or adolescent the method of "escaping" into an unreal world may be linked to compensating for something important, for an adult, immersion in a behavioral addiction is also a way to shirk responsibility for events in real life.

Most modern online computer games give a person the opportunity to feel competitive. L. O. Perezhogin and N. V. Vostroknutov suggest that gaming among adolescents is the most widespread form of behavioral addiction today.

M. G. Chukhrova notes that the prevalence of addiction can vary significantly across different geographical regions. For example, internet addiction affects approximately 0.8% of the population in Italy, whereas in Hong Kong, it is observed in 26.7% of the population. The emergence of addiction is influenced not only by demographic and socio-economic factors and the internal dynamics of a person's social environment but also by a genetic predisposition. However, not everything can be attributed to genes. The development of both chemical and behavioral addictions involves not only "bad genes" but also pathophysiological processes and comorbid disorders in children and adults.

Today, shopaholism, preoccupation with video games and social media, workaholism, excessive engagement in physical exercise, eating disorders, promiscuous sex, and other manifestations of addictive behavior have negative social consequences. All these phenomena present a contradiction; some of them, such as workaholism and sports addictions, are socially acceptable in modern society.

The debate among psychiatrists, clinical psychologists, neuroscientists, and behavioral therapists on whether to classify behavioral addiction as a disorder or merely an extreme manifestation of behavior continues unabated in the scientific world.

Addictions in the Animal World

Addictions afflict not only humans but are also observed among animals. In scientific experiments, researchers worldwide study the formation of various dependent states in our "smaller brothers."

It is not only domestic animals living alongside humans that consume alcohol or other substances capable of altering behavior patterns. In some cases, humans themselves may set a bad example by offering their pets alcohol. However, even without human involvement, animals in the wild consume varying amounts of ethanol from fruits, which can constitute the primary diet of some birds, mammals, and insects.

In 2014, neurobiologist K. Olson from Oregon Medical University, along with colleagues, analyzed the songs of "tipsy" zebra finches. The scientists gave the birds juice containing 6.5% alcohol. The authors note that finches, being typical songbirds, learn their unique songs in a manner analogous to how humans acquire speech. During the experiment, the neurobiologists discovered that the birds not only willingly consumed alcohol but also experienced changes in their song structure; after drinking, they literally began to "slur" in parts of their songs, producing an indistinct rhythm and melody. With a significant increase in blood ethanol levels, the finches sang more quietly and with an altered acoustic structure. The scientists observed pronounced effects, including not only a reduction in amplitude but also an increase in song uncertainty, caused by alcohol's disruption of overall rhythm maintenance.

It is noteworthy that changes were observed in the birds' song performance, but no coordination impairments were detected in their general behavior. No general behavioral changes were identified in the zebra finches after "having a drink." That is, they sang "drunkenly" but behaved soberly. This interesting study provided scientists with a deeper understanding of how alcohol affects formed neural circuits in the birds' brains. Another intriguing aspect is that under alcohol's influence, some birds tried to "enunciate the syllables" of their songs more clearly, while others, conversely, became confused in their song's rhythm and "syllables."

Most often, scientists study the effects of alcohol on laboratory rats, domestic animals, and primates. However, there is a nuance: primates and rats lack a vocal apparatus similar to humans, whereas the vocal apparatus in birds and humans functions similarly, both in terms of neural control and complex behavioral responses.

Finch chicks learn complex trills from their fathers (not least because male finches sing more variedly and complexly than females), just as children learn speech from their parents and social environment. The study of "drunken" finch songs may help scientists determine how alcohol affects the neural mechanisms of our speech.

For humans, systematic and uncontrolled alcohol consumption has devastating consequences, but how does it affect animals and insects?

Biologists F. Wince, A. Zitmann, M. A. Lachance, and R. Spannagle observed wild shrews in the tropical forests of Western Malaysia and found that some individuals of these cute, pleasant-looking animals systematically consume the alcoholic nectar from the flower buds of a local palm tree.

This small animal measures 5 – 8 cm in body length and weighs 4–16 grams. The shrew's muzzle is highly elongated and resembles a small trunk. Malaysian shrews are natural pollinators of the bertam palm.

As representatives of their family, shrews are generally beneficial to humans and cause no harm, although they occasionally engage in mischief and may raid beehives to feed on bees. There are about 70 species of shrews in the global fauna, all occupied with their own affairs: some eat insects, others eat worms, and others actively dig in the earth. However, the Malaysian shrews daily consume the alcoholic nectar from the flower buds of the bertam palm. Scientists have recorded a maximum alcohol concentration of 3.8% in the palm nectar. As it turns out, this is the highest concentration of alcohol ever recorded in a natural food product.

This is because a certain amount of yeast thrives in the palm's flower buds, which is why the nectar contains a high level of alcohol. Nevertheless, the shrews that systematically visit the palm flowers show no serious signs of intoxication. These small animals have a high tolerance for alcohol, as the shrew's interaction with the bertam palm is rooted in a long evolutionary process.

An analysis of the shrew's hair showed that the concentration of alcohol in the animal's body is significantly higher than that in a human with an equally high level of alcohol consumption.

Scientists suggest that alcohol consumption, ranging from moderate to high levels, was present in these shrews even in the early stages of their evolution. However, it is not yet clear to what extent the shrews benefit from alcohol consumption or how they mitigate the risk of consistently high blood alcohol levels.

Unlike the Malaysian shrews, which, like the zebra finches, appear composed "under the influence" and show no behavioral signs of intoxication, another animal – the pen – tailed treeshrew – also consumes the nectar of the bertam palm and behaves quite respectably. In fact, the pen – tailed treeshrew is the most prolific drinker among all visitors to the "palm bar." This animal consumes more nectar than other enthusiasts. We can only hypothesize that alcohol might have a positive psychological effect on the animals, but there is no substantial evidence for this.

This unique bar in the Malaysian jungles is regularly visited by gray tree rats and Malaysian rats, as well as the slow loris. The most frequent patrons are the treeshrews and lorises. They spend 86 to 138 minutes on the palm tree every night.

B. Wince, who studied the "bar life" of Malaysian animals, installed surveillance cameras around the palm. During the research, no serious behavioral changes were ever recorded in the "drinking" animals.

Unfortunately, such resistance to alcohol was not passed on to humans in the evolutionary process; we can only envy the Malaysian treeshrews and shrews—they can drink without getting drunk.

R. Dudley, a biologist from the University of California, Berkeley, studied the mechanism of human attraction to alcohol for about 25 years. In his 2014 book, The Drunken Monkey: Why We Drink and Abuse Alcohol, he proposed the hypothesis that the attraction to alcohol began to form in our primate ancestors, who heuristically discovered that the smell of ethanol could lead them to ripe fruit. Studying monkey behavior, R. Dudley identified a pattern: the animals seek out fruits that are ripe enough for their sugars to have fermented. During this fermentation, the fruit juice develops about 2% alcohol, and the monkeys eagerly consume such fermented fruits.

Primatologists C. Campbell and V. Weaver from California State University, Northridge, collected partially eaten fruits discarded by spider monkeys living in Panama and found 1–2% alcohol in them, a byproduct of natural yeast fermentation. Analysis of the monkeys' urine revealed that it contained secondary metabolites of alcohol. The researchers concluded that the animals used fermented fruits for energy.

Subsequently, C. Campbell, together with R. Dudley and A. Maro, studied the diet of chimpanzees in Uganda to test R. Dudley's "drunken monkey" hypothesis. Observations confirmed the presence of ethanol in their food, and a certain amount of alcohol was also detected in the chimpanzees' urine. However, no serious behavioral or physiological consequences from consuming overripe fruit were identified. The fruits preferred by the monkeys contained an alcohol concentration equivalent to that of weak beer or cider. The fruits of the jobo tree are one such example.

C. Campbell suggested that monkeys obtain more calories from fermented fruits than from unfermented ones, and more calories mean more energy. The scientists concluded that the fruit selection priority of human ancestors was similar; they preferred fruits saturated with ethanol because they provided more energy to the body.

However, researcher C. Milton expressed skepticism about biologist R. Dudley's hypothesis and published a critique of his study in the journal Integrative and Comparative Biology. In her article, C. Milton argues that ethanol is more likely to repel primates than to attract them. She states that when fruits contain higher levels of ethanol, both humans and other primates avoid consuming them, using smell as a guide. C. Milton notes skeptically that there is no benefit from ethanol; it is merely a pleasant toxin. She proposed her own theory for the human attraction to ethanol, the essence of which is that humans lack the innate wisdom regarding dietary habits, unlike primates. Human culture has been fermenting alcohol for millennia, and as a result, through the experience of previous generations, people have learned to appreciate it. According to C. Milton, the reason for this human attraction to alcohol has nothing to do with nutrition or health; people are drawn to any substance capable of altering their consciousness.

If the situation with primates is more or less clear, the case with African elephants remains less straightforward to this day. In 2006, scientists S. Morris, D. Humphries, and D. Reynolds set out to debunk the myth of the drunken elephants of Southern Africa. Africa is an exotic continent with various intricate, whimsical folklore stories, and the tale of drunken wild elephants is one of them. The suggestion that the African elephant gets drunk by eating the fruit of the marula tree is a fun story for tourists, the press, and even scientific works. According to S. Morris, an elephant might occasionally eat marula fruits, but there is no clear evidence of elephants becoming intoxicated in the wild. Based on calculations using human physiology for comparison, a 3,000 kg elephant would need to consume approximately 10–27 liters of 7% ethanol to reach a state of behavioral change.

Marula fruits contain about 3% ethanol. An elephant, which typically has a varied diet, would obtain an average of 0.3 g/kg from these fruits, which is half the amount required for intoxication. Thus, the hypothesis that elephants get "drunk" from gorging on marula fruits remains unconfirmed.

However, this myth has troubled scientists for many years. In 2023, researchers from Botswana decided to follow S. Morris and his colleagues in attempting to dispel the myth of African wild elephants in Southern Africa becoming intoxicated from marula fruits. T. Makopa and G. Modikwe, along with other researchers, collected marula fruits from an area exceeding 800 km² in Botswana and isolated about 160 yeast strains from them. Approximately 93% of these isolates typically ferment simple sugars and produce ethanol. The ethanol content in the marula fruits suggested it could potentially influence elephant behavior in the wild if consumed in large quantities. However, data from a single study proved insufficient to refute the myth of drunken elephants. The notion that elephants become drunk and behave badly after gorging on marula fruits remains unproven and continues to be propagated in modern South African folklore. While the case of the elephants remains unclear, the situation with honeybees is better understood.

American scientists I. Ahmed, C. Abramson, and I. Faruq observed that honeybees hovering near an ethanol source, or even their fleeting flight past it, can cause kinematic changes in the bee's body and wings.

To capture significant changes in the body and wing movements of honeybees under the influence of ethanol vapors, the scientists used four high-speed cameras (9000 frames/sec). Using statistical analysis tools, the observers investigated kinematic changes in the bees' bodies and wings caused by exposure to increasing ethanol concentrations from 0% to 5%. The bees exhibited a changed body roll angle, a decreased wingbeat frequency, and an increased wingbeat amplitude. However, the researchers did not specify the cause: were the bees becoming intoxicated, or was it related to other factors?

Back in 2006, Slovenian scientist J. Božič, while studying the behavior of intoxicated bees with a team of other researchers, noted a correlation between increased ethanol levels in the bee's body and changes in behavioral responses. J. Božič, along with colleagues C. Abramson and M. Bedenčič, trained honeybees to visit feeders containing sucrose and 1 – 10% ethanol. Observing the behavior of the "drunken" bees, the scientists discovered impairments in their behavioral acts within the hive.

Communication among bees occurs through a specific set of movements, a kind of dance, through which they convey information to each other. When consuming alcohol, the bees showed reduced activity in waggle dances and an increased frequency of tremble dances. The "drunken" bees also engaged in food exchange more frequently than their sober counterparts and performed body cleaning rituals somewhat more often. The changes in honeybee behavior under ethanol reflect the alcohol's impact on their nervous system. Similar behavior occurs in insects poisoned by sublethal doses of insecticides.

In 2018, K. Miller, K. Kushevska, and V. Privalova, in their study on the effects of ethanol on honeybees, revealed features of adaptive responses in the insects.

The honeybee is often used by scientists as a simple invertebrate model for alcohol-related research. To date, several consequences of consumption have been demonstrated in honeybees, but tolerance to ethanol consumption as a sign of alcohol abuse had not been demonstrated in scientific experiments for a long time.

Polish scientists confirmed the hypothesis that the motor impairment response to ethanol is lower in bees that have previously experienced its effects. Bees exposed to alcohol for the first time more clearly demonstrated intoxication, expressed in movement disorders. The data led the scientists to conclude that bees over time acquire resistance to the effects of alcohol, which could hypothetically be a sign of alcohol abuse. Theoretically, if we transpose bee behavior to human behavior, could bees with increasing tolerance to alcohol subsequently become dependent?

The culmination of the story of bees under the influence of alcohol is the research by Polish scientists M. Ostap – Chek, M. Opalek, D. Stek, and K. Miller, which showed that bees do, in fact, exhibit signs of a hangover.

M. Ostap – Chek and colleagues investigated the characteristics of alcoholism in honeybees and observed manifestations of withdrawal syndrome in the insects. In worker bees that had long-term consumed food supplemented with alcohol, pronounced seeking behavior and a clear striving for immediate ethanol consumption were observed after access was discontinued. The researchers also noted a slight increase in mortality among the bees as a result of withdrawal and subsequent access to alcohol.

In the human world, seeking behavior is observed when a person dependent on alcohol, drugs, or a behavioral addiction searches for an opportunity to use consciousness – altering substances or ways to satisfy their need. For instance, a drug – dependent person starts contacting people who potentially use or know where to obtain illicit substances. Driven by the seeking motive, the person strives to meet with other substance users and seeks opportunities to use them.

But let's return to the bee study. The results of M. Ostap – Chek and his colleagues' research showed that not only do bees develop alcohol dependence, but they may even experience a hangover syndrome.

Another team of Polish researchers, led by J. Korczyńska and A. Szczuka, studied the influence of ethanol and acetic acid on the behavior of worker narrow – headed ants in 2023. The experiment studied the behavior of worker ants. For a set period, one group of ants was placed near cotton pads soaked with water, another near a pad saturated with an aqueous ethanol solution, and a third near a pad soaked in acetic acid. The researchers conducted 30 simultaneous five-minute tests for each group.

According to the scientists' observations, ethanol and acetic acid caused significant changes in the insects' movements and affected their exploratory behavior, grooming rituals, and level of aggression during interactions with nestmates. Ants near the cotton pad soaked in acetic acid demonstrated aversive behavior, while the group near the pad saturated with ethanol showed enhanced exploratory behavior; under ethanol's influence, the ants began to bustle about.

In the wild, without human intervention, there is another interesting example of how ants come under the influence of a behavior – altering chemical substance.

A 2015 scientific article by Japanese biologists described interesting relationships between caterpillars of the subfamily Lycaenidae and ants. There are about 5,200 species of Lycaenid butterflies in the world, predominantly living in the tropics, but about 450 – 500 species have perfectly adapted to live in the planet's northern regions.

Lycaenid butterfly caterpillars have adapted through evolution to cohabit with ants. Lycaenids found in Indonesia, Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, and North Korea are representative myrmecophilous butterflies.

Myrmecophily is a strategy whereby living organisms exist within or near ant nests. Thus, myrmecophiles are animals or insects that live in association with ants and depend on them for a certain period.

The Lycaenid caterpillar living in Japan secretes a fluid containing sweet substances that attract ants. The caterpillars possess a special dorsal nectary organ that produces this secretion, which contains neuroregulators that compel the ants to remain at their "guard post" nearby and provide protection. The ants consume this secretion, and the neuroregulators within it affect their reward system. In this way, the caterpillar ensures the ants' loyalty and protection – a natural mechanism of "zombification." An ant, having become dependent under the influence of the secretion, never returns to its colony and transforms into the caterpillar's guardian, defending it from spiders and parasites. Incidentally, the relationship between aphids and ants operates on a similar principle; aphids also reward ants. Ants protect aphid colonies from ladybugs and lacewings and move their charges to more succulent young plants. In return, the aphids provide the ants with metabolic sugar, serving as another example of mutually beneficial interdependence in the insect world.

Dependent behavior related to ethanol has even been observed in nematodes. C. Salim, E. C. Kane, and E. Baishan – research fellows in the Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center (USA) – studied the compulsivity of alcohol – seeking behavior in soil-dwelling nematodes in 2022. Under the influence of certain neuropeptides, these roundworms demonstrate compulsive alcohol-seeking behavior and persistently continue their attempts. However, when influenced by other neuropeptides, they exhibit a sustained aversion to alcohol consumption. Perhaps through deeper study of neuropeptide regulation in animal models, scientists can learn to induce a similar aversion to alcohol consumption in humans.

A significant number of studies on the effects of alcohol and narcotic substances are conducted using rodents. In 2004, researchers at the Charleston Alcohol Research Center in South Carolina (USA) specifically trained male laboratory mice to drink alcohol (15% ethanol) for two hours daily.

During the experiments, the mice had constant access to food and water. Once a stable baseline level of alcohol consumption was established, the mice were subjected to 16 – hour periods of alcohol vapor inhalation interspersed with 8-hour withdrawal periods. This cycle was repeated four times, followed by a 32 – hour period. After the final ethanol exposure, all mice were observed and tested for alcohol consumption under limited access conditions for five consecutive days. Subsequently, the animals received a second series of ethanol exposure with withdrawal periods, followed by another five – day behavioral assessment period. What was the outcome of this experiment?

Following repeated cycles of chronic alcohol exposure and withdrawal, ethanol consumption in the mice increased significantly compared to control groups, which were not subjected to any interventions and lived without alcohol.

The alcohol – trained mice subsequently exhibited pronounced seeking behavior and voluntarily consumed ethanol when offered. Consequently, alcohol dependency with characteristic withdrawal syndromes was artificially induced in the mice.

In the wild, there are various instances of animals consuming substances, mushrooms, berries, or plants that would typically cause death or poisoning in humans. In 2021, K. Suetsugu and K. Gomi from Japan's Kobe University noted that local Japanese squirrels safely consume poisonous fly agaric and death cap mushrooms. These mushrooms play important roles in maintaining forest ecosystems. Fly agaric is known for the toxic properties of its hallucinogenic components, such as ibotenic acid, muscimol, and muscarine. Serious cases of fly agaric poisoning in humans can include delirium, hallucinations, convulsions, and sometimes fatal outcomes.

A typical symptom of fly agaric poisoning is the visual distortion of object sizes. Now, raise your hands if you have read Lewis Carroll's fairy tale Alice's Adventures in Wonderland? (If you haven't, I recommend it.)

Remember the episode of Alice's meeting with the Caterpillar, sitting on a mushroom cap, lazily smoking a hookah?

All these manipulations with pieces of the mushroom in the tale, leading to changes in size, are nothing other than the effect of poisonous substances, possibly from the fly agaric, on human consciousness.

However, the Japanese squirrels that consume poisonous fly agarics not only remain unharmed but also show no behavioral signs of intoxication. The squirrels have adapted to eat poisonous fungi, though the reason remains unknown. Scientists hypothesize that the squirrels may act as carriers of fungal spores to new habitats, and to test this, K. Suetsugu plans to study squirrel droppings.

Unlike the Japanese squirrels, dogs in Kentucky have been far less fortunate. In 2019, the Journal of Veterinary Diagnostic Investigation published a case by M. Romano, H. Doan, and R. Poppenga describing a fatal outcome in a domestic Labrador Retriever due to fly agaric poisoning. Confirming mushroom poisoning in dogs can be challenging in veterinary practice. Ingestion is often unobserved, and clinical manifestations are non – specific and could be attributed to numerous other causes. This case was diagnosed using a PCR test. The veterinarians did everything possible but could not save the dog. This is not an isolated incident of fly agaric poisoning in domestic dogs.

M. Romano and colleagues suggested that dogs might be attracted by the fly agaric's distinctive fish – like odor. Thus, what is permissible for Japanese squirrels is clearly unacceptable for domestic dogs in Kentucky.

The illicit consumption of narcotic substances has large – scale negative consequences for human society worldwide and unexpectedly contributes to polluting aquatic ecosystems through wastewater. A study by Czech scientists led by P. Horký, R. Grabic, and K. Grabicová identified the negative impact of methamphetamine contamination in water on brown trout behavior.

The researchers obtained results demonstrating that methamphetamine, a global threat to human health, when introduced into freshwater ecosystems, significantly affects trout motor behavior and induces methamphetamine preference during withdrawal. The Czech team conducted their experiment under controlled laboratory conditions and did not release methamphetamine into natural rivers or water bodies. The fish used in the study, housed in special incubation tanks, were acquired from a local supplier with documentation confirming they were healthy and disease-free.

In total, scientists observed the behavior of 120 fish divided into two equal groups of 60. One group was exposed to methamphetamine dissolved in their tank water for eight weeks. Every other day, researchers replaced two – thirds of the water volume in this tank.

The remaining 60 trout served as a control group, living undisturbed in their tank without methamphetamine exposure. When deprived of methamphetamine, the exposed trout exhibited characteristic drug-seeking behavior. Drawing parallels to human addiction models, where withdrawal symptoms include increased anxiety and stress, the scientists noted reduced movement in trout – interpreted as a stress symptom related to methamphetamine withdrawal. In a similar 2017 study, G. Bosse and R. Peterson observed a "depressed" state in trout during methamphetamine withdrawal, which they also interpreted as withdrawal syndrome.

Why are some animals susceptible to psychoactive substances while others show no behavioral changes or desire to consume behavior – altering substances?

This question was investigated in a 2020 study by Canadian researchers: M. Janiak, S. Pinto, G. Daichaeve, M. Carrigan, and A. Melin.

The team presents genetic evidence for differences in ethanol metabolism among mammals. Some animals possess the ADH7 gene, which enhances metabolic protection against intoxication. This gene increases the efficiency of ethanol – processing enzymes in some mammals by 40 – fold. Thanks to ADH7, shrews can safely consume doses of fermented bertam palm nectar that would be toxic to humans, showing no signs of intoxication. While some animal species can consume alcohol and psychoactive substances in fruits, mushrooms, and plants without significant harm, humans often struggle with these substances, and systematic use leads to dependency.

Despite extensive research in biology, evolutionary psychology, and other interdisciplinary sciences, the effects of alcohol, narcotics, and various toxins on insects, mammals, and fish remain inadequately studied.

Human understanding of these processes also remains incomplete, with ongoing debates among scientists and clinicians. For instance, neuroscientist M. Lewis questions the conceptualization of addiction as a disease.

The disease model characterizes addiction as a brain pathology, supported by evidence of alterations in brain systems governing behavioral control and delayed gratification. This model is grounded in biological data. Within this framework, researchers have analyzed genetic variations and factors predisposing humans to psychoactive substance use, impulsive buying, and other addictive behavioral patterns.

But what if we view addiction not through the lens of disease, but through the perspective of personal choice? What if addictive behavior is, first and foremost, a conscious choice made by the individual? Why does a person choose dependence? What motivates them to make decisions that lead to self – destructive behavior? This perspective is also complex; the concept of choice is certainly more intriguing than the disease model. At the very least, the choice model offers hope that decisions can be different and that a person's patterns of behavior and thought can be changed. In contrast, the disease model appears to remove an individual's responsibility for their decisions, giving them the benefit of being "sick" and implying it is not truly their fault. The thinking becomes, "It just happened; there's medicine and research, so perhaps they can help me get rid of this addiction as if it were a disease."

As the author of this book, I find a comprehensive approach to the causes of addiction more compelling. Ultimately, both external circumstances and internal personal factors play a role. Dependency can be influenced by an adverse environment, stress, high anxiety, an inability to assume responsibility, and a lack of specific resistance skills. But people are not animals; we possess consciousness and have choice. We can make decisions. And we make them, ultimately, in favor of either addiction or self – preservation.

Addictions in the Human World

Let's be honest: we are neither shrews nor pen-tailed treeshrews, although some people can drink themselves into an animal-like state by consuming excessive alcohol. But to speak frankly, how many fermented fruits would a person need to eat to become intoxicated? Did you seriously just think about dozens of kilograms? Do you believe that is feasible for a modern human, who has a million alternative ways to become inebriated?

We derive pleasure from food, creativity, contemplating art in galleries, massages, swimming in the sea, adult films, children's movies, classical music, and punk rock. Some find it in dancing and skydiving. We are different; we all desire a state of pleasure and comfort. It so happens that everyone's "high" is individual and distinct. Some get their kick from adult films, others from running correlation analyses on scientific data. The reward is unique to each person. If you asked several people, "Do you like pastries?" the answers would vary. One would describe the pleasure of lemon meringue, another would prefer a tartlet with buttercream, and a third would choose a pastry with berry jelly.

Even our craving for sweets and the pleasure from pastries with light cream can be explained by nutrition specialists or considered an evolutionary remnant from a biological perspective. Through evolution, we became programmed to obtain calories from food. This is logical: sugar and fat – anything high in calories – provide abundant energy. However, the human drive to consume large amounts of sugar for sensory fulfillment is not always justified in the modern world. Yes, such a strategy was likely warranted in primitive times when hunter-gatherer tribes struggled for survival. In lean years, they had little choice but to gorge on whatever fruits, plants, or roots they found, as the chance of finding more was slim. Life was harder for primitive tribes than for modern humans. In ancient times, people often did not live past 30–35 years – a fact that the renowned Russian anthropologist, science communicator, and genuinely good person, S. Drobyshevsky, could confirm. In primitive society, the risk of being eaten by your own tribesmen or people from other tribes, dying from an unknown illness, or being killed over a piece of meat you refused to share was very high. Therefore, rapidly consuming large quantities of found fruit was a justified behavioral strategy for ancient humans. But for modern humans, the desire to "stress – eat" sweets or to refuse food in an effort to conform to contemporary standards of slimness and beauty leads to behavioral disturbances, sometimes culminating in eating disorders such as anorexia, bulimia, or binge eating.

The point is that eating disorders represent specific behavioral patterns that lead a person to a particular dependency. We will definitely discuss eating disorders in one of the chapters of this book.

Scientists continue to debate the purpose of intoxicating substances for humans: are they a relic of the past or a special evolutionary "perk"?

Incidentally, the hypothesis that orgasm serves as a reward for reproduction is highly questionable. The role of the male orgasm as a reward during ejaculation is more or less understood, but what is its purpose for women? Millions of women in the world become pregnant and carry offspring without experiencing orgasms. Some do not even understand their purpose or know what they are. During solo sex (so beautifully termed masturbation), a person certainly does not experience orgasm as a reward for reproduction. And what about orgasms during sleep for adolescents and adults? These questions, and indeed issues of sex, gender, and reproduction in general, have been studied by staff at the Kinsey Institute since 1947.

Excessive dependency on solo sex and on sex in general can not only signal personality maladaptation but may also indicate the presence of a mental disorder; furthermore, the cause of increased libido can be organic brain disorders. So what is the common thread between the desire to get dead drunk, engage in solo sex while watching an adult film, gorge on sweets to the point of nausea, or play at a casino? All these phenomena relate to addiction. Addiction is most often what society calls a vice, and a vice, in turn, is the pursuit of pleasure through condemned means for short-term gratification, here and now. An obsessive infatuation with another person, involving pathological stalking and an overwhelming desire to possess them, accompanied by fits of jealousy, is also a form of behavioral addiction.

First, we must examine the history of substance use disorders – that is, those human habits where the instrument for achieving pleasure is a specific substance, rather than a behavioral pattern.

Proponents of the theory of evolutionary remnants believe that the human desire to drink might have been justified for our ancestors and somehow helped them adapt to a hostile environment, even though the strategy of constantly "drinking heavily" is irrational today. However, we drink together not to later sentimentally confess our love under alcohol's influence, nor even because drinking alone is frowned upon (this doesn't stop alcoholics), but because this tendency developed over the course of evolution, as biologist R. Dudley has written – if you read the first chapter, you know whom I'm referring to. His theory is, of course, controversial, and not all biologists agree with it.

According to R. Dudley, we drink and eat together, in company, because from an evolutionary perspective, sharing food with one's family, pack, or community is rational. Within the evolutionary process, we unconsciously perform this atavistic action even today. We seemingly need our pack, family, or tribe to survive. From an evolutionary standpoint, drinking in company is advantageous for higher primates (humans are higher primates) if only because if you were to get drunk alone in ancient times, a predator might drag you off and devour you, whereas attacking a drunken group of kin is not so easy.

There is no reliable evidence indicating precisely when humans began consuming intoxicating beverages. No one knows how it all started – whether humans discovered some fermented liquid by chance or devised methods to produce it from fermented fruits. However, there is a curious hypothesis suggesting that bees may have played a role in this process. According to this theory, humans might have first encountered alcohol when a storm destroyed a bee nest in a hollow tree. Water flooded the nest, causing the honey inside to ferment and produce mead. Of course, this hypothesis is about as plausible as the African myth of drunken elephants gorging on marula fruits – no evidence, just speculation.

Let us apply logical thinking: for a liquid containing sugar and yeast (essential for the process) to ferment into an alcoholic beverage, it must be contained in some kind of vessel. This would require humans to abandon nomadism and adopt a settled lifestyle.

Perhaps when humans mastered agriculture and established permanent settlements, this higher primate learned to produce beverages from plants. However, such reasoning remains hypothetical and may be erroneous despite its apparent logic. There is another, more plausible alternative hypothesis.

In modern Turkey stands the ancient megalithic structure known as Göbekli Tepe. This temple complex dates back 12 000 years, to approximately the 9th millennium BCE. Archaeologists first took notice of it in the early 1960s. Among various significant artifacts, several stone basins were discovered at the site, the largest with a capacity of 180 liters. One might assume these were used for bathing, except for one detail: the basin walls bear traces of chemical compounds called oxalates. To any chemists reading this – don't be concerned; direct all questions to the archaeologists, as this is their hypothesis. The oxalates in these ancient Turkish stone basins could have resulted from mixing barley and water to produce fermented mash. Generally speaking, this hypothesis also lacks firm evidence, and we are free to imagine people gathering at Göbekli Tepe to drink ancient mash, possibly a prototype of beer. No one can forbid us from speculating. One thing is certain: the Sumerians had drinking establishments, though their names remain unknown. But as soon as one reads Sumerian epics, it becomes clear that everyone drank alcohol on various occasions – and without any occasion at all.

The emergence of the European alcohol tradition and the use of psychoactive substances are described in the scholarly articles of Doctor of Historical Sciences V. M. Lovchev, a public figure from Kazan. Relying on the reflections of S. N. Sheverdin, V. M. Lovchev posits that when human labor began to yield a surplus from intensive crop cultivation, people started storing it for future use. This, in some instances, led to product fermentation. They could not discard the surplus, as food was too hard-won in ancient societies, so they consumed the fermented masses. Thus, so to speak, humans became acquainted with alcohol. The historian contends that alcohol is an evolutionary bug – an error, a fortuitous accident that arose because early humans, through trial and error, made discoveries that were both brilliant and, subsequently, detrimental to humanity.

Let us return to the Sumerians. In Sumerian mythology, there was a goddess, Ninkasi, who presided over beer and other alcoholic beverages. Thanks to the work of Doctor of Historical Sciences V. Afanasyeva, a poet and translator from Sumerian and Akkadian, we have the text of the hymn to the beer goddess, Ninkasi, today.

…Oh, the fine beer you are brewing,

Mixing honey and wine, you pour it drop by drop,

Oh Ninkasi, oh the fine beer you are brewing,

Mixing honey and wine, you pour it drop by drop…

Given the facts and evidence, the Sumerians cannot deny this – they clearly drank and brewed beer and wine. By studying Sumerian writing as a hallmark of their civilization, we know today not only of their epic literature but also that they wrote debt notes listing barley, gold, and beer.

One of the earliest depictions of a beer vessel dates from around 3200 BCE; it was conical in shape. As civilization developed, its representation on clay "notes" became more schematic, eventually turning into a stylized icon with two strokes. Almost nothing remained of the original depiction; the strokes evolved into a character.

Incidentally, among the Sumerians, poetry about alcohol was written by a woman named Enheduanna. Where she found the time is unclear, but perhaps this maiden had leisure for composition because she was a princess, the daughter of the Akkadian monarch Sargon the Great. In short, from ancient times to the modern world, familial influence has been important in human societies. If a person works for a prestigious company, they will likely arrange positions for relatives or friends; in this regard, nothing has changed since the Sumero – Akkadian era. Enheduanna was the king's daughter, and, of course, her father appointed her as the high priestess of the moon god Nanna in Ur. Sargon had a wife, Tashlulum, who bore him five children. But only Enheduanna composed impassioned hymns to the Sumerian gods, which were later translated into Russian by V. K. Afanasyeva.

According to O. Dietrich, the Sumerian production of alcoholic beverages was not intended for long – term storage but rather involved large-scale, single-batch production for specific ritualized feasts. Such libations were not exclusive to Sumerian civilization; later, the rulers of China's Yellow River valley and the Incas in South America also used the production and consumption of alcohol at festivals for political purposes, such as forging alliances with neighboring rulers. Rulers also used alcoholic drinks to mobilize labor; for instance, ancient Chinese rulers rewarded their subordinates with alcohol for collective work.

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