The Heart of Addiction: An Emerging Paradigm for Understanding Addiction

Course overview

Brain research and human development research is advancing co-occurring counseling to a place where clients will have a better opportunity to thrive. Clinicians often view substance use disorders primarily as cognitive and behavioral issues. A pathological perspective views substance misuse from a neurological issue. This workshop explores what is perhaps the key to understanding addiction, viewing it from an attachment disorder perspective. Vincent Felitti attributes adverse childhood experiences that have resulted in poor attachments and poor emotion regulation as a high-risk factor for addiction. Kathy Brous says, alcoholics in particular may be born with a sense of separation which results in neurotransmitter deficits. Bickhart, et al. 2010 reported that amygdala volume correlates with reported social network size and complexity. When considering what has been learned about the brain and what works, a new way of looking at addiction and recovery is needed. Schindler and Broning demonstrated empirical evidence strongly supporting the correlation between patterns of attachment and SUD. As anticipated, more studies are needed utilizing SUD assessments that measure attachment disorder. Effective prevention and treatment start with understanding the role attachment disorders have in cooccurring disorders, and inversely understanding how healthy relationships positively impact recovery.