The Molecule of More: How a Single Chemical in Your Brain Drives Love, Sex, and Creativity―and Will Determine the Fate of the Human Race

by Daniel Z. Lieberman

Finally, the requirement was bumped all the way up to sixty-four presses for a single Bioserve tablet. The normal rats managed about twenty-five hundred presses—more than one press per second for the entire 30 minutes. The dopamine-depleted rats didn’t increase their work at all. In fact, they pressed less than they had before. They simply gave up.

The results reveal a subtle but vital distinction. The feeling of hunger (or the absence of hunger) changed how much the rats valued the pellets, but it did not diminish their willingness to work.

Hunger is an H&N phenomenon, an immediate experience, not an anticipatory, dopamine-driven one. Manipulate hunger, or some other sensory

experience, and you affect the value of the reward earned through work. But it’s dopamine that makes the work possibl...

The ability to put forth effort is dopaminergic. The quality of that effort can be influenced by any number of other factors, but without dopamine, there is no effort at all.

We need to believe we can succeed before we are able to succeed. This influences tenacity. We have greater tenacity when we encounter early success.

Drugs such as cocaine and amphetamine boost dopamine, and one result is an increase in self-efficacy, often to pathological levels. People who abuse these drugs may confidently take on so many projects that it is impossible to complete them all.

Heavy users may even develop grandiose delusions.

Under normal circumstances, robust self-efficacy is a valuable asset. Sometimes it can act like a self-fulfilling prophecy. Having a confident

expectation of success can make obstacles melt before your eyes.

Participants who took the complementary posture not only liked the confederates more, they also felt more comfortable with them compared to the participants who mirrored the confederates.

We unconsciously know when someone has a high expectation of success, and we get out of their way.

We submit to their will—the overwhelming expression of their self-efficacy, powered by control dopamine.

Our brains evolved this way for a good reason: it’s a bad idea to get int...

Success inspired confidence; confidence produced success.

A relationship that is formed for the purpose of accomplishing a goal is called agentic, and it is orchestrated by dopamine. The other person acts as an extension of you, an agent who assists you in achieving your goal. For example, relationships we make at networking events are primarily agentic, and typically result in mutual gain. Affiliative relationships, on the other hand, are for the purpose of enjoying social interactions. The simple pleasure of being with another person, experienced in the here and now, is associated with

H&N neurotransmitters such as oxytocin, vasopressin, endorphin, and endocannabinoids.

There are personality types for each variety of relationship preference. Agentic people tend to be cool and distant. Affiliative people are affectionate and warm. They are also social, and turn to others for support.

People who are good at both affiliative and agentic relationships are friendly, accessible leaders, such as Bill Clinton

or Ronald Reagan. Those who are less able to navigate agentic relationships are more likely to be friendly, accessible followers. Those who have trouble with affiliative relationships but who are skilled with agentic ones may be viewed as cold and uncaring, ...

Agentic relationships are established for the purpose of dominating one’s environment to extract as much as possible from the available res...

“Shall I tell you the secret of the true scholar? It is this: Every man I meet is my master in some point, and in that I learn of him.”

Such a relationship is agentic because the relationship is about gain—gaining knowledge.

Moral or immoral, dominant or submissive, it’s all the same to dopamine, as long as it leads to a better future.

In modern society, submissive behavior is often a sign of elevated social status—think of the strict adherence to manners, the focus on social customs, and, in conversation, the deference to others that is part and parcel of the behavior of what we might call “the elite.” The common name for this behavior is courtesy, a word derived from the word court, because it was the behavior originally adopted by the nobility. By contrast, dominant behavior, representing the opposite of courtesy, may stem from personal insecurity or an imperfect education.

Instead of taking a bow for walking on the moon, Colonel Buzz Aldrin, PhD, told his admirers, “It’s something we did. Now we should do something else,” apparently no more satisfied than if he had painted a fence. His desire was not to bask in

his glory but to find “something else”—the next big challenge that could hold his interest. This perpetual need to identify a goal and calculate a way to reach it was perhaps the most important factor in his historic success. But it’s not easy having so much dopamine coursing through the control circuits. It almost certainly played a significant role in Aldrin’s post-lunar struggle with depression, alcoholism, three divorces, suicidal impulses, and a stay on a psychiatric ward, which he described in his candid autobiography, Magnificent Desolation: The Long Journey Home from the Moon.

some people have so much control dopamine that they become addicted to achievement, but are unable to experience H&N fulfillment.

These individuals exhibit the effects of an imbalance between future-focused dopamine and present-focused H&N neurotransmitters. They flee the emotional and sensory experiences of the present. For them, life is about the future, about improvement, about innovation. Despite the money and even fame that comes from their efforts, they are usually unhappy. No matter how much they do, it’s never enough.

I have walked on the surface of the moon. What could I possibly do to top that?

people whose control dopamine circuits are weak? Their struggle with internal control manifests itself as impulsivity and difficulty keeping themselves focused on complex tasks.

(ADHD).

ADHD is seen most often in children, and for good reason. The frontal lobes, where control dopamine acts, develop last, and do not fully connect to the rest of the brain until a person finishes adolescence and enters adulthood.

One of the jobs of the control circuit is to keep the desire circuit in check; hence the impulse control problem associated with ADHD.

When control dopamine is weak, people go after things they want with little thought about the ...

with ADHD grab toys and cut in line. Adults with ADHD make impulse purchase...

The most common treatments for ADHD are Ritalin and amphetamine, stimulants that boo...

When these drugs are used to treat people with ADHD, tolerance usually doesn’t develop as it does for those who take these drugs to lose weight,...

People who live with ADHD are at high risk of addiction, especially adolescents, because of their poorly functioning frontal lobes.

But rigorous testing showed unambiguously that adolescents who were treated with stimulant drugs were less likely to develop addictions.

In fact, those who started the drug at the youngest age and took the highest doses were the least likely to develop problems with illicit drugs.

Here’s why: if you strengthen the dopamine control circuit, it’s a lot easier...

With few friends, poor grades, and cut off from healthy sources of pleasure, children living with untreated ADHD become more willing to pursue unhealthy sources of pleasure.

Winning competitions, along with eating and having sex, is essential for evolutionary success. In fact, it’s winning competitions that gives us

access to food and reproductive partners. As a result, it’s not surprising that winning competitions releases dopamine.

The surge of dopamine feels good, but it’s different from a surge of H&N pleasure, which is a surge of satisfaction. And that difference is key: the dopamine surge triggered by winning leaves us wanting more.

It’s not enough to win the Tour de France. It’s not enough to win it twice or even seven times. Winning is never enough. Nothing is ever enough for dopamine. It is the pursuit that matters, and the victory, but there is no finish line, and never will be. Winning, like drugs, can be addictive.

Yet the pleasurable rush that never satisfies is only half of the equation. The other half is the dopamine crash that feels so awful.

Winners cheat for the same reason that drug addicts take drugs. The rush feels great, and withdrawal feels terrible.

Both know that their behavior has the potential to destroy their lives, but the desire circuit doesn’t care.