Addictive behaviors may relate to an imbalance in brain excitation and inhibition.

“My colleague Anna Lumpky who wrote to Nation >> Yeah. She once said that um many addicts, behavioral addictions, uh I guess they call them process addictions or chemical addictions, that they have this feeling that unless they're experiencing something really intense >> like life isn't really happening. Like they crave this intensity of experience. They want peak experience. >> Yeah. >> Either to numb themselves. I mean it could be a trough experience in the case of sedatives but um that stuck with me implied in that is that not everyone is seeking these um kind of extreme states and so layered on what you just described in terms of excitation inhibition balance I kind of wonder if um if people who struggle with addiction are um they're craving getting out of too”