Ventral striatum activity when watching preferred pornographic pictures is correlated with symptoms of Internet pornography addiction

• Published in: NeuroImage (Orlando, Fla.) Vol. 129; pp. 224 - 232
• Main Authors: Brand, Matthias, Snagowski, Jan, Laier, Christian, Maderwald, Stefan
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Elsevier Inc 01.04.2016; Elsevier Limited
• Subjects: Addictions; Addictive behaviors; Adult; Age; Arousal - physiology; Behavior; Behavior, Addictive - physiopathology; Brain Mapping; Cybersex; Erotica - psychology; Eroticism; Gratification processing; Humans; Hypotheses; Image Processing, Computer-Assisted; Internet; Magnetic Resonance Imaging; Male; Males; Medical imaging; Photic Stimulation; Pornography; Pornography & obscenity; Reward; Reward anticipation; Sexual Behavior - physiology; Sexual Behavior - psychology; Studies; Surveys and Questionnaires; Ventral striatum; Ventral Striatum - physiology; Ventral striatum; Pornography; Gratification processing; Cybersex; Reward anticipation

One type of Internet addiction is excessive pornography consumption, also referred to as cybersex or Internet pornography addiction. Neuroimaging studies found ventral striatum activity when participants watched explicit sexual stimuli compared to non-explicit sexual/erotic material. We now hypothes...