The headline is broadly defensible, but the qualifications matter. Effect sizes vary by population, the strongest claims rest on shorter trials, and credible voices push back on how it's typically framed.
Now, of course, there's a range in between depressed and manic. And most people, fortunately reside somewhere in that range. And it is indeed a continuum. And I think it's safe to say that levels of dopamine probably do correlate with levels of happiness. But there is no one single chemical nor chemical signature, that is, no specific recipe of two parts dopamine, to one part serotonin, to one part acetylcholine that we can say equates to happiness.
Every Sunday: the week’s new conflicts and verdict changes — and nothing else.
Native comments, Twitter mentions, and Reddit threads about this claim — surfaced together so the conversation isn't fragmented across platforms.
Bookmarking — the dossier-vs-overview split is the right call. Most of the time I want overview; sometimes I want receipts.
Would love a "what would change this verdict" RSS feed. Sign me up if it exists.
So we need to completely discard with the idea that any one neurotransmitter or any one neuromodulator is solely responsible for a state of happiness or for a lack of state of happiness, for that matter.
And that there is no one chemical signature of happiness. There's no one neural modulator or combinations of neuromodulators that we can say is the cocktail for happiness.