Addiction or compulsive disorder?

[SOPHAN]

Hi all,

I try to read and understand more and more about problematic pornography use and came across different frameworks.
On the one hand, I catch myself getting annoyed by these academic discussions bc I feel like at this point ANY public recognition with whatever pathway is better than none.
However, for those of us who are interested in the research aspect of conceptualising and thus determining how to approach this issue, I would be curious to hear if you have the feeling that problematic porn use rather represents an addiction or a compulsive disorder.
For clarification the main difference would emerge in how to manage, treat, and "heal" the problem.

Either way, I also found this quote very suitable:
"Chains of habit are too light to be felt until they are too heavy to be broken."
- Warren Buffet

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts.
Best wishes

 

[TakeControlNow]

I've been trying to quit porn for over ten years now with successes and failures and I have OCD. I think it can be both honestly. It's an addiction in that there are real withdrawal symptoms and cravings and the OCD part of it is when I have a setback I feel like I MUST PMO a certain number of times. It's pretty frustrating.

 

[Fappy]

whichever one it is is irrelavent. it fucks up peoples lives and changes the brain. OCD or addiction doenst matter - kill it.

 

[vidvan13]

I agree that identification would help assign a treatment. But I would question the wisdom of this quantized bifurcation - addiction and compulsive disorder. Like most of the things there is a scale on which it falls for any person. Let me take the following definitions:

The difference between compulsive behaviors and addiction is urge versus need.

• A compulsion is an insatiable urge to do something.
• Addiction is a need to do something to experience pleasure or remove discomfort.

Doesn't a cigarette addict have an urge to smoke that many times a day and a person with compulsive behavior of checking locks have a need to do it? When not satisfied the cigarette smoking guy goes crazy with headaches and sweats. When not satisfied the guys with compulsive behavior is anxious all night and can't sleep in his bed.

The scientific rigor is necessary to put these things down. For the lack of understanding of brain, the objective classification was done at the behavior and symptom level, which is the best they could do when the clinical definitions originated. However with all the brain mapping and neuro-electric evidence now available the right thing to do is to comprehensively study these patterns and see if the old 'definitions' hold true and change them if they don't. Every scientific construct is an attempt to model a phenomenon under certain assumptions. It is time to reconstruct those models at the brain activity level for a more resolute classification. It, however, takes time even for scientists to see and consider newer results. But I hope the primal action of questioning, even what is considered established laws, continues to hold true and help our knowledge grow. The new researchers should express their opinions as reproducible as possible for others to look at. Only when people can reproduce your results, question them and are convinced of your conclusions will the experiment become knowledge. Science is slow.

Having expressed my thoughts on the classification issue, I do believe that there is a component of both - addiction and compulsive behavior in problematic pornography. And hence it needs all - healing, treatment and management. I am sure it should be possible to put the symptoms you encounter into the two categories and see where it leads you. We rely on research to uncover what part is what and what is the suitable methods required to the path of recovery. Good luck with your investigations.

 

[96LostWanderer]

I'd agree that a serious porn viewing habit has elements of both addiction and compulsion based on the descriptions above. I feel like I am addicted but I also have obsessive compulsive tendencies in life generally, although I've never been formally diagnosed with OCD.

 

[canguro]

I really have not much knowledge on the topic of compulsive disorder, but I don´t really understand, why porn use should be cd and not addiction. I read about people mentioning it in context of porn use, but I never understood.
1. In porn use we can see an escalation spiral which means that the addict gets desensitized and needs more stimulation which equals more of the used drug. We had the example of someone having to check the locks every evening, but even if we are seeing an increase in the shown behaviour the reason is a totally different, it´s not that the person gets used to it, but that maybe the anxiety whatsoever increases which leads to an increase in the behaviour. In porn use I think every single person who watches porn in an addictive way sees an escalation towards more extreme material, because the old one becomes boring soon.
2. It´s a bit hard to explain for me in english, but I´ll try.
A difference I see is in the direct reason for the use. We addicts use(d) because we craved it, because our brain told us, how great it would be etc. Do people with compulsiv disorder crave their behaviour? I think there is more a component of fear like "something bad will happen if I don´t do this particular thing".
There are we again at the example vidvan wrote:
The smoker will crave a cigarette and think about how great it would feel to light it and suck in the smoke.
The guy with the locks won´t think about how great it would feel to check the locks, but what could happen if he forgot one and that won´t let him get sleep until he checked it.

Take ControlNow wrote about how he needs to masturbate a certain amount of times if he relapses and I think an addiction never rules out an CD in general, but I think that this is not something most addicts experience. Feel free to proof me wrong

But I would really like to hear some arguments why some people consider this an compulsive disorder instead of an addiction.

 

[SOPHAN]

To be honest, even while researching in the field, I am not quite sure.
I find your depiction very helpful though, canguro, thank you very much.

I think a differentiation matters not necessarily for the affected person but it matters for medical guidelines and what treatment will be recommended. It is likely that it won't be the same for everybody as well.

I think the controversy about the 'addiction' is more so bc porn isn't a substance, and behavioural addictions are still ambiguous within research.
However, I personally agree with the majority on here. I think it is an addiction due to the commonly described need to consume porn, the novel-seeking and typically increase in frequency and/or intensity of content, the perceived inability to stop the consumption, reported withdrawal symptoms with abstinence, etc.

Thank you all for your comments, it was really helpful.