If it comes from the Bay Area of California, it either must be the coolest trend on the planet – or the most ridiculous idea you can conceive. Well, take your pick, because the newest trend from Silicon Valley, known as dopamine fasting, is on the way to your own little world.

One would think that people who spend their lives devoted to sciencey tech stuff would be pretty careful about what they do to their brains. And yet, those are the folks who seem to be most devoted to this latest West Coast “health” fad, as a way to “reset” their brains, which may be the very reason it seems to be gaining traction elsewhere.

So, what is dopamine fasting and is their any science to back it up?

First, let’s move beyond the overly simplistic belief that dopamine is the “pleasure molecule” our brains produce, the thing that causes us to feel good. In fact, dopamine is much more influential and important than simply bringing us pleasure.

As explained in an abstract from a study on the importance of the chemical, “The [neurotransmitter dopamine]… plays important roles in neuromodulation, such as motor control, motivation, reward, cognitive function, maternal, and reproductive behaviors… through both the peripheral and central nervous systems.”

In other words, it does a great deal more than influence your feelings and moods.

The Idea Behind Dopamine Fasting

However, it is this overly simplified idea of the role of dopamine in the brain that has led to this ascetic trend, that “Dopamine is a neurotransmitter involved in our brain’s system for motivation, reward, and pleasure… [and that since] we may be getting too much of a good thing in today’s attention economy, and we need to carve out time without stimulation from things that can become addictive – smartphones, TV, internet, gaming, shopping, gambling – so that we can regain control over how we spend our time.” (Vox.com)

In other words, if you give up the most rewarding things in life you can reduce your levels of dopamine and “reset” your brain, refocus on things that really matter, and truly appreciate them. (Denial as its own reward? That is certainly not a  new phenomenon.)

Does Dopamine Fasting Work?

According to the latest neuroscience research, and as described in an article by Ciara McCabe, Associate Professor, University of Reading, all of this begs the question, “…given the important role of dopamine in vital functions in the human brain, why would we want to fast from it? The idea of dopamine fasting is based on the knowledge that dopamine is involved in unhealthy addictive behaviours.”

As she explains, the production of dopamine is stimulated more by wanting than by receiving; that is, “expectation and anticipation of rewards”, rather than the rewards themselves.

Because of this, she argues, the dopamine fasting trend is aimed at the wrong target: the result instead of the cause. “After all, it is these cues that initiate the craving and the desires to engage in behaviours that help us get the rewards. Thus just cutting out rewards doesn’t necessarily stop the brain from making us crave them – activating dopamine.”

And further, the idea “that this would ‘reset the brain’ is not really correct – there is no way of even knowing what the baseline is. So, from a neuroscience perspective, this is nonsense for the time being.”

So, instead of sacrificing the rewards of wanting through dopamine fasting, it makes far more sense to remove the triggers that can lead to cravings, what might be referred to as “trigger fasting”, instead.

On the other hand, it is in fact very possible to retrain your brain, through the practice of mindfulness and mindfulness training. We will explore this effective method for doing all the things that proponents of dopamine fasting seek, and explain why it is a far better (and safer) approach in our next post… Stay tuned!

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