What is changing in the brain when something amazing happens to you for the first and you feel great. But the next time it happens you don’t get as excited as before and then after the 100th time it has no effect on your happiness?

Question

I know it’s the same as getting bored / loosing interest. But is it like a sort of dopamine resistance??

In: Other

Answer 1

The hedonistic treadmill, and diminishing returns.

First the hedonistic treadmill. Brain likes patterns and sets expectations. When a good thing happens unexpectedly, it’s great! When it happens twice, hey, ok, this is a thing that happens. When it happens yet again, you can.start to expect it. Patterns make sense. It’s solved – this is a recurring event and expected. Rely on it, your brain says. It’s not out of the ordinary. It’s completely ordinary. Brain is satisfied it did its job of making a pattern. Only something different is extraordinary.

Diminishing returns is even simpler. When something fulfills a need or want, boom, that’s amazing. But the amazing bit isn’t the thing, it’s the need or want being fulfilled. There’s less need now. So the reward is less too. You get it again, it fills a smaller need, the reward is fine. When you don’t need it anymore, and there’s no more gap to fill, the reward is nothing. You were cold, you got a blanket. Sweet. Two blankets, nice. Third, ok sure. Fifteenth?? No thanks.