I know what scientists are looking at when they say addiction is a disease. I don’t dispute the findings, but I dispute the interpretation of them. They see addiction as a chronic brain disease — that’s how they define it in very explicit terms. My training is in emotional and personality development. I see addiction as a developmental process.

What I emphasize is that the disease label makes it worse. You have experts saying, “You have a chronic brain disease and you need to get it treated. Why don’t you come here and spend $100,000 and we’ll help you treat it?” There’s a very strong motivation from the family, if not the individual, to go through this process, and then the treatments offered in these places are very seldom evidence-based, and the success rates are low. 

Neuroscientist And Former Addict Explains What We Get Wrong About Addiction

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