Pleasure is a very central thing to human nature.
I think it’s what gets us up in the morning, but to define pleasure is quite difficult.
One of the best definitions of pleasure actually comes from Aristotle.
Aristotle had this idea that pleasure had at least two components: hedonia, pleasure,
and eudaemonia, a life well-lived.
My research is really about finding out the kind of things that give us pleasure,
the kind of things like food and sex that really allows us to survive both as an individual and as a species.
Eudaemonia, of course, is why we’re here. We want to have well-lived lives,
we want lives of well-being, but to measure that of course, is very difficult and part of my research
is to find the links between these two things.
It’s surprisingly difficult to show that somebody who is happy is also somebody who has a lot of pleasure,
or have a lot of pleasure currently.
All we can say, is that if you are unhappy, you are very likely to suffer from anhedonia,
the lack of pleasure.
But it’s not as if if you are happy all the time, that you have a constant level of pleasure,
instead you have these spikes.
So pleasure is a short state, almost like a peak experience in a much longer state, which is happiness.
Think about food, I just had a very nice meal, so right now I’m not thinking too much about food,
but in a few hours I'll start to think about where my next meal is going to come from.
At some point you would have gathered enough food and then you would start to consume it,
at which point you would like, and this of course is where the pleasure comes in.
So the question becomes not only why do we have those states,
But also, what it is that is driving those states?
What is it that is happening to my brain as I want something, and when I like something,
and when I can’t have anymore?
And so my research is really trying to focus on trying to find out how these different forces come together.
What are the brain regions that are responsible for each of those particular phases?
So one of the things we found in my research, is that there does seem to be a sort of unitary
side to pleasure.
It does seem as if there's like an inner sanctum of brain regions that have to talk
to each other in a certain way that gives us pleasure.
So different parts of the brain are involved in this, so some parts are more important
when it comes to the wanting, to drive us, to motivate us to get it.
And then of course once you then consume them, other regions take over and give us that kick,
that joy that we get from those things.
And then again, once that is no longer, for a certain pleasure is no longer, they will then shut down.
Now the reason why this is important, is of course, in the normal system, there’s sort of
a give and take system that works over time.
But once you have anhedonia, the lack of pleasure, which of course is what happens
when you're depressed, when you’re bipolar, all of the affective disorders have this, is really that
inner sanctum, this unitary experience of pleasure which is being damaged in some ways.
And of course the breakdown of that can be very different.
In addicts for instance, they want things more and more and more and actually with time,
like things less and less and less.
While of course in other things, you just have a general diminishment of the involvement
of both the wanting and the liking.
So by understanding these, if you like, atoms of these complex molecules, you actually get
a deeper insight into what is going wrong.
And so if you wanted to fix it, if you wanted to try and rebalance the brain by understanding the,
the underlying mechanisms, you have a much better chance of targeting those mechanisms.
My research has focused on all of the pleasures, but of course one of the most important pleasures is sex,
which is also one of those that are slightly taboo
It turns out it's actually very difficulty to actually do studies of people having sex in scanners.
It's in most countries something that is frowned upon. So I did what most researchers would do
in this situation: I allied myself with a Dutch person.
So one of the great experts in this world when it comes to sex research is [NAME]
and he has basically carried out some of the most exciting studies out there.
He’s looked at what happens when both men and women have sex or sexual experiences in a scanner.
And so of course when you think about what sex is, we find out that there are certain
things out there that we may become interested in.
And we get excited that we start wanting those things, we get aroused.
Certain brain parts are engaged in this, and at some point we start to enjoy them
and uniquely, I think, amongst many other pleasures, you have this moment
of great, great pleasure, the orgasm.
And so, what we did was we took our data and we looked at when they had this marker.
What happened was the part of the brain called the orbitofrontal cortex changed its activity only when you
had the big, pleasurable experience of an orgasm and not when you didn’t.
So you get this nice sort of curve where you get the point and then after awhile it sort of deactivates if you like.
And then by doing that, you can actually look at what happens in the different stages.
What are the brain regions that turn on and off?
Of course this is a complex dance, if you like.
It’s something that is of considerable interest also because a lot of affective disorders
have problems that manifest themselves in having problems in each of these phases.
So it’s very common, that if you’re depressed, that you find it very difficult to get aroused
in the first place, or you find very difficult to actually like things.
Or certain kinds of depression, or addictions even, you get so excited about the sexual stimuli -
that you in fact will spend all your time looking for all the paraphernalia and not
actually take great stock or like very much the actual orgasm.
And so you’re stuck in this this perennial searching for that particular pleasure, and not actually enjoying it
when you finally get it. You forget to have a balanced life.
You forget to do the most important thing when it comes to pleasure, mainly variation.
Variation rather than moderation is probably the most important thing when it comes to pleasure,
and I think foremost you forget about the biggest pleasure of all, which is what my research is showing,
is that it’s not so much neither the food, the sex, or the drugs, it’s the other people that are filling our lives
When you think about it in an evolutionary context, it makes a lot of sense.
Food, on it’s own, is of course quite pleasurable, but it is usually better with other people.
And usually, in evolutionary history, you would need other people to help us procure the food
that allows us to survive.
And sex, without somebody else present doesn’t really lead to procreation.
And so, we need other people, and we need them and our brains know this, our brains know that
we need other people. And one of the things that’s malignant, if you like, about addiction
when it comes to drugs, is that it’s a very solitary experience.
So one of the big things about pleasure, I think, is the fact that it’s not egoistic.
It’s about altruism, it’s about empathy, it’s about compassion.
And my research clearly shows, that that is why we’re here - is to enjoy pleasure with other people.