Tavia wrote:

Mistral:

...

I may have to dispute the chocolate. My understanding is that chocolate causes _some_ of the same changes in brain chemistry that substances more generally considered addictive do - elevated endorphins, and serotonin too, IIRC (makes a lovely pain-killer). The brain wants more, so it forces chocolate cravings. I'd call that an addiction, if a very mild one.

My earlier point exactly. Speaking as an ex-chocolate addict, however, I'd query the 'mild'. (I had to give up eating chocolate at all some years ago when my daily chocolate intake threatened to go from two Mars bars to three.)

In so far as any of the B7 material (written or pictorial) can be considered pornographic, it is never *physically* addictive, so comparisons with certain drugs, nicotine or chocolate are unrealistic.

The question then that this leads me to ask (in all sincerity, as even though it might seem silly, I don't know the answer) is this: since we do know that visual stimuli can affect the brain (as strobe lights an epileptic), and since we do know that sexual arousal has a definite effect on (or really occurs in) the brain, do we actually know that viewing titillating material _doesn't_ cause these addictive-type changes in brain chemistry? There is such a thing as sex addiction, after all. I'm certain someone must have done some studies on the subject of the effects on the brain of viewing sexually explicit material; is anyone aware of such?

Mistral