Science & Research - Addiction & Mental Health Resources

April 25, 2025

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Addiction: The Science Behind (NOVA PBS)

This incredibly informative documentary from NOVA PBS discusses opioid addiction, highlighting that addiction is not a moral failing, but rather, a treatable chronic medical condition. It provides a general overview of the science behind addiction, detailing how dopamine, the reward pathway, and other brain regions change as a result of substance abuse, and how these changes result in drug-seeking behaviours and withdrawal. While there are several personal stories from those affected by addiction, the primary focus of this documentary is to provide education on the science behind addiction and the importance of evidence-based treatments.

April 24, 2025

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Opiate Addiction: Strategies for Creating Long-Term Sobriety

This webinar addresses specific barriers to sobriety experienced by those with an opiate addiction, as well as several effective strategies for helping them obtain long-term recovery and sobriety. Attendees will learn ways to increase treatment effectiveness with this population and reduce the likelihood that a client with an opiate addiction will leave treatment prematurely.

April 23, 2025

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The Psychology and Neuroscience of Gambling Addiction

In this presentation, Dr. Luke Clark, Director of the Centre for Gambling Research at UBC, will consider the modern conceptualization of pathological gambling (or Gambling Disorder) as a behavioural addiction. After briefly reviewing diagnosis and prevalence, the talk will focus on the distorted styles of thinking that occur during gambling, and their neurobiological basis in terms of brain chemistry and the brain reward system.

April 23, 2025

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Gambling Addiction by Design: Slot Machines

Anthropologist Natasha Dow Schüll, the author of Addiction by Design: Machine Gambling in Las Vegas, spent 15 years studying how casinos and slot machines are designed to pull users into a trancelike state called the “machine zone” where social demands, worries, and bodily awareness fades away. While in this zone, gamblers are not just playing to win, but rather, to play for as long as possible, regardless of the physical, mental and financial costs. While the gambler loses themselves, the gambling industry profits. She extends this research into digital / smartphone gambling as well.

April 23, 2025

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Ketamine: Realms and Realities (Hamilton’s Pharmacopeia)

Hamilton Morris meets with Timothy Wyllie, an artist, writer and architect best known for his role in founding a controversial religion called The Process Church, and whose life has been a continuous quest to understand the mysteries of his own consciousness. He then heads to India to see industrial ketamine synthesis, and speak with therapists and luminaries in an attempt to understand the role of dissociative anesthetics in society.

April 23, 2025

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Beating Alcohol Addiction Through Evidence-Based Treatment

This documentary follows Mike Pond, a therapist managing his alcohol addiction. He was only ever offered one treatment after losing his practice, his house, his family, and becoming homeless: Alcoholics Anonymous. This abstinence-based treatment approach did not work for him, so he started looking for other ways to heal himself and others. Mike is an advocate for “compassionate, evidence-based treatments” and feels that “harm reduction, or any positive change, offers clients the best chance of beating addictions.”

April 23, 2025

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How Cannabis Affects the Brain & Body (Huberman Lab)

In this episode, Dr. Andrew Huberman discuss cannabis (aka marijuana), including the biological mechanisms underlying its effects on the mind and body, its known medical applications, its impact on libido, creativity, hunger, hormones and more. He also covers the known adverse health consequences of chronic and even acute (one-time) use and the factors that determine if cannabis is helpful or harmful.

April 20, 2025

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What Alcohol Does to Your Body (Institute of Human Anatomy)

This video by the Institute of Human Anatomy discusses “the pathway alcohol takes as it travels through your body.” It covers the various organs and tissues that interact with booze and how a hangover occurs, as well as how it can effect people differently. You’ll see real cadavers (body parts) and it’s really quite interesting.

April 20, 2025

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What Alcohol Does to Your Body, Brain & Health (Huberman Lab)

This podcast with Dr. Andrew Huberman, a professor of neurobiology and ophthalmology at Stanford School of Medicine, discusses what alcohol does to your body, brain, and overall health. Some topics include (1) the physiological effects of alcohol on your brain and body, (2) genetic differences that predispose some people to alcoholism, (3) alcohol metabolism and how it acts as a poison, (4) the impact it has on neuronal functioning, thus changing our thinking and behaviour, (5) the impacts on inflammation, stress, neurodegeneration, gut microbiome, brain thickness, mood, and more. It is a 2-hour podcast that dives deep into this topic and provides an interesting and easy-to-understand look at how alcohol effects your brain and body.