reward pathway
Brain's motivation system
The reward pathway is a network of brain structures that produces feelings of pleasure and motivation.
It evolved to reinforce behaviors essential for survival—eating, sex, social bonding—by releasing dopamine when we engage in them.
The term appears frequently in discussions of addiction, where drugs or behaviors hijack this system: Cocaine floods the reward pathway with dopamine.
Also called the reward system or mesolimbic pathway.
- dopamineReward-linked neural messenger
- pleasureHappy, satisfied feeling
- pleasure centerBrain region triggering enjoyment
- brainSeat of cognition
- brain chemistryBrain's chemical signaling processes
craving · addiction · motivation · desire · anticipation · rush · high · neurotransmitter · euphoria · instant gratification · seeking · compulsion · trigger · habit · reinforcement · serotonin · stimulus · urge