Pop a Pill to Boost Your Brain Chemistry?
Several brain scientists recently wrote in the journal Nature (published online December 7) that it is time that science and society explore and, ultimately, sanction the use of pills to enhance brain function in people with no psychiatric disorder at all. After all, they reason, pills already exist that can improve attention span, memory and alertness in normal individuals. Many students already use illegally obtained Adderall to boost their academic performance, and many adults use Provigil to stay awake and energetic at work. So why not sanction the use of these drugs and, perhaps, many others to help anyone who might want to perform better and feel better?
Using pharmaceuticals to change one’s mood, energy level or comfort socializing, one could argue, isn’t any different than men (who are not impotent) using Viagra to improve their sexual performance or any of us drinking six cups of caffeinated coffee a day to stay more awake and feel a little happier or less irritable.
There’s potential trouble, however, with any plan to open the floodgates and allow pharmaceutical manufacturers to develop and market substances that alter brain chemistry in healthy people. One of the problems is that it could easily raise the bar in terms of what it takes to be competitive in school or at work—just as letting athletes freely use performance enhancing drugs in sports would make it a near-necessity for every athlete to use them.
Another problem is that once we green light chemically synthesized compounds for people without any disorder who simply want to be happier, more productive or more energetic, our laws against illicit substances like opiates (including pain killers like Percocet and Oxycontin) start to look suspect. It could be argued that there may be millions of Americans with low potential for addiction who might enjoy the euphoric effects of Oxycontin, be able to work long into the night while using it and be able to stop using it periodically to prevent themselves from becoming fully dependent on it.
Perhaps the biggest problem is that using pills to alter how we function intellectually, emotionally or otherwise can easily create a tide that sweeps us further and further from the reality of our life circumstances. Even if your work makes you unhappy, why consider following your heart to another career when you can change your brain chemistry so you feel alert and energized just by popping a pill? Why make fundamental changes in your marriage to improve it when you can dose yourself with a substance that will make you feel calm and connected at home, without changing a thing? Why learn to lead a balanced existence, with the time you need to reflect or to recharge, when all the valleys in your day can feel like peaks? Sounds a lot like taking a drink or smoking a joint to dodge reality, doesn’t it?
It is probably inevitable that growing numbers of Americans will turn to pharmaceuticals already in existence to boost their brainpower. But it may be a desirable brake on a potential runaway train that doctors currently have society’s blessing to prescribe medications only to those suffering with recognized psychiatric disorders. Defining life itself, including work life, as a kind of disorder worth treating, or as a baseline to be raised chemically (higher and higher), feels like floating free of our ties to our real-life emotions and passions and possibilities.
Dr. Keith Ablow is a psychiatry correspondent for FOX News Channel and a New York Times bestselling author. His newest book, “Living the Truth: Transform Your Life through the Power of Insight and Honesty” has launched a new self-help movement. Check out Dr. Ablow’s website at livingthetruth.com or e-mail him at info@keithablow.com.
Tags: Adderall, adhd, brain chemistry, Dr. Keith Ablow, energy, pharmaceuticals, Provigil, socializing, stimulant drugs
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As a psychiatrist who believes in the “medical model” of mental illness, I fully agree with the above opinion. Despite increasing understanding that mental illness is a medical illness just like heart disease or diabetes, medications arent always the key to recovery. Diet and exercise etc are essential for not only mental health but physical health. After all, the brain is an organ too!
Yes medications are sometimes necessary to alleviate suffering, but drugs are not ALWAYS the answer. We need to make our world and ourselves better holistically, not just drug ourselves into delerium.
Well stated, Dr Ablow. Why would one want to alter the chemistry in a healthy brain? In addition to the points Dr Ablow made about why this is a precarious notion, we know little about how most prescription drugs impact the brain long-term, as well as how they may interact with each other, especially when used without physician supervision. While we’re all to quick to look for easy fixes, we ignore the downside of altering brain chemistry at our own peril.
This is a typical neo-luddite response, while resigned to it even. What makes him think those with enhanced cognitive function would not be more aware of drawbacks in their current situation and would not be more capable of addressing those circumstances?
As our society moves towards the future with a greater understanding of medical science and the functioning of both our minds and bodies, it is inevitable that society will develop drugs which enhance cognition in the absence of harmful side effects. The role of medical professionals is limited to ensuring that said drugs are safe and effective, not producing lofty musings that ration safe benefit along personal, philosophical lines. Suggesting that perfectly healthy and well-functioning individuals need no treatment is medical idealism at its best.
Not everyone will enjoy their career, and some will never enjoy any career, regardless of cultural attitudes or societal teachings on life. The same is true of marriages. If medical science develops a way for such individuals to live more happy and productive lives, and offer a better standard of living to their families, then what ground exists for denying that treatment if no established harm can come of it?
The comparison with opioids is not valid, as these drugs have a clearly established potential for physical addiction. The “lifestyle” drugs in question may encourage dependence, but only in the sense that cessation offers no tangible benefit, and is therefore not rational.
The breed of medical philosophy expressed in this article is dangerous, as it denies medicine to those who would benefit from it. Doctors should never be withholding safe medicine due to a philosophical belief that life is meant to be lived without it.
Well Tom, let me tell you something about higher cognitive function and addiction. It has been studied and proven that those with significant IQ and cognitive abilities fall into dependency and addiction at a rate HIGHER than those with less function. Some psychiatrist attribute this to the “awareness” and “control” someone wants to have over the situation, and higher intellectual people tend to be aware and want to control. Now not to boost my ego, but to be honest I have 4 undergraduate degrees and 2 Masters degrees (none in biology) I read extensively, have a photographic memory, and can tip the charts on IQ about the mid 190’s.. and YES I WAS AN ADDICT/DEPENDENT. When I injured my back I too discovered that warm fuzzy feeling when you took a vicodin or oxy, or whatever. It wasnt long until I found myself on Actiq (Fentanyl) lozenges at the maximum dose at about 10-14 a day. Couple this with Neurontin first then Lyrica, Xanax, Remeron, Ellavil, Zanaflex. Only after finding a new pain management doctor was I able to understand my pain was 10% physical and 90% mental. I have got better control of my pain with less medicine, and can look back ashamedly but honestly and say I knew what drugs could do, and I DID IT ANYWAY. So this is a slippery slope that we are on and we best tread lightly. Finally, some are going to fuss about Addict vs Dependent.. When you need a pill to function and cant think of life without it.. you are BOTH!!!!!!
What a load of garbage Dr. Ablow writes – better living through chemistry has long been practiced by people with the knowledge and opportunity to do so. Ablow blows on about how drugs can take us ‘further and further from the reality of our life circumstances’ as though that was a bad thing. Hey, our life circumstances are that we get older, get sicker, lose our capacities, and then die. Ameliorating this forced march to disability and death is obviously a desirable and humane pursuit – so let us be happier, be a bit sharper, feel less pain with the help of the judicious use of chemistry. After all, as J.M. Keynes said, ‘in the long run we are all dead.’
Besides being highly addictive/causing dependency, psychotropic drugs are very strong chemicals that don’t target the brain, but cause systemic effects throughout the entire body. These are not “happy pills” — these are powerful toxins that when taken long-term can cause a multitude of severe health problems.
No matter how the “experts” dress up this Brave New World, this is not “better living through chemistry” but a health crisis in the making.
Even though my life is a challenging one
I do not want medications to
affect my emotional state and
being intelluctual is far over rated.
Thanks Dr Ablow for protecting us from
Pharmaceutical Giants.
Taking a pill or doing anything else to alter your brain chemistry can have both positive and negative consequences depending on how you put it into practice.
If you alter your brain chemistry to the point where you think that there is nothing better than sitting in a room by yourself for a couple days without eating, that would be bad because it has negative consequences for your health, both mentally and physically.
On the other hand, if you alter your brain chemistry to feel closer to your family, have more energy at work, and get more enjoyment from listening to music, that’s all good stuff and is good for you.
There are many ways to alter your brain chemistry that don’t involve pills: Diet, exercise, sleep and sex are a few. Pills can supplement a healthy lifestyle that is already getting the most from good practices in the aforementioned categories.
I disagree with the analogy of steroids for athletes. Certain performance enhancing drugs are illegal because they have negative health consequences. There are many other performance enhancing supplements that athletes use that are legal because they don’t have negative health consequences. Creatine, for example.
The concept of “sick” in the area of mental health is relative. Let’s improve everyone’s brain chemistry with diet, exercise, sleep, sex, music, meditation, anything else that works, and finally, chemicals that are proven by modern science to have positive effects with no negative health consequences.