6533b7d1fe1ef96bd125d512

RESEARCH PRODUCT

The more the ‘Merrier’: A multi-sourced model of addiction

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description

Very few contemporary approaches on addiction specifically aim to address the question of why people who are well-aware of harmful consequences continue to perform addictive behaviours. The aim of this article is to introduce a model of addiction which addresses this question. This model integrates the existing theoretical approaches on addiction in one framework by arguing that the majority of contemporary accounts of addiction are not mutually exclusive in the sense that the occurrence or prominence of one process does not preclude the occurrence of another. Moreover, the suggestion is that the majority of these accounts are in effect supportive of and cooperate with each other in order to shape a background on which addiction flourishes. This approach views addiction as a matter of synergy where many social, environmental, historic, personal, neurological and chemical mechanisms simultaneously work together in order to form behaviours extremely resistant to change. The conclusions of the present analys...