“I’m just a chemical in your head
I’m just that Dopamine
So come on line me up
Come on line me up”
As a neuroscience major, it makes me extremely happy when words about the brain and nervous system enter the popular vocabulary. And recently, I’ve noticed people have been using neurotransmitters to talk about their feelings. If someone wants to say something brings them joy, they’ll say, “That’s my dopamine!”. Or, if someone feels unhappy, they might share a meme about how they want more serotonin (like the meme below!)
But to me, the biggest indicator of whether something has entered the popular consciousness is if there’s music about it. So, through the article series “Neurotransmitter Notes”, I want to chat about songs that talk about the 8 major neurotransmitters: epinephrine, norepinephrine, dopamine, serotonin, GABA, acetylcholine, glutamate, and endorphins. Today, we’ll tackle the most famous neurotransmitter of them all: dopamine.
Neurotransmitters
Hold on, what’s a neurotransmitter? The Encyclopedia Brittanica defines a neurotransmitter as “any of a group of chemical agents released by neurons (nerve cells) to stimulate neighbouring neurons or muscle or gland cells, thus allowing impulses to be passed from one cell to the next throughout the nervous system” (Neurotransmitter | Definition, Signaling, & Types | Britannica, n.d.). So, neurotransmitters (NTs) are chemical messengers that neurons use to pass signals onto one another. What differentiates NTs from one another are that NTs will only be sent and received by the neurons that have the protein receptors that fit with it. Neurons are classified by the type of neurotransmitter it can “understand”: so, you’ll have dopaminergic neurons (which send and receive signals about dopamine). Those dopaminergic neurons, when binding to dopamine, will cause the effects that are associated with dopamine.
Dopamine’s Effects
Like I mentioned earlier, dopamine is known as the “happy” chemical. But it’s not just released when you feel good: it plays many, many other roles. One role is controlling decision making. For instance, higher levels of it are related to whether someone chooses to do a more difficult, rewarding task over a simpler, less rewarding one (Dopamine Affects How Brain Decides Whether a Goal Is Worth the Effort, 2020). These facts, I’m sure, were handy when writing the lyrics to this dance jam:
“You make all the dopa-dopamine in my bloodstream
The way you touch me, I’m loving the feeling
Of dopa-dopamine in my bloodstream
Let it control me, I’m loving the feeling”
– “Dopamine”, Purple Disco Machine ft. Eyelar
The songwriters have demonstrated here the happy feeling associated with dopamine, as well as its importance in controlling behavior. However, there’s also an error: neurotransmitters don’t travel in the bloodstream. Dopamine happens to be unique because it has an alternate form that does travel in the bloodstream, but that form doesn’t have the same effects as what the song’s describing. It’s likely that they mixed up neurotransmitters with hormones, which do travel in the bloodstream.
Dopamine Doesn’t Just Move You, It Motivates You
Not only can dopamine make you feel good and affect your decision making, it can impact your motivation. This motivation can be in the form of how well you can focus and retain information for a task (executive function). Executive dysfunction occurs in people with ADHD, who also often have lower levels of dopamine in their brain (Logue & Gould, 2014).
Motivation also plays a role in addiction. The ventral tegmental area (VTA) is a section of neurons in the brain that play a major role in people with addictions, and these neurons are dopaminergic. In the song “Dopamine” by Bliss n Eso, the singer talks about his reliance on alcohol to help him through times of stress. This chorus describes how it felt for him to use it:
“When there’s no way out
When I don’t believe
When I’m coming down
You’re my dopamine”
However, over the course of the song, he cites his connections to his wife and child as motivation to become a better person. And by the end, this same chorus has taken on a new meaning. By the way, long-term intense romantic love still makes your VTA light up with dopamine, years after the honeymoon period has ended (Acevedo et al., 2012).
Dope-amine or Nope-amine?
I suppose we can take from this a lesson: dopamine is not just a feel-good chemical– it’s crucial for the proper functioning of your brain. Don’t try to chase that short-term high: if you take care of yourself and make meaningful connections to other people, dopamine (and life satisfaction) will come to you.
Check out this playlist with the tunes mentioned in this article, as well as some other neuroscience related songs! (Note: please be aware that some songs in this playlist may have explicit lyrics.) I’ll be back soon with some more Neurotransmitter Notes!
References
Acevedo, B. P., Aron, A., Fisher, H. E., & Brown, L. L. (2012). Neural correlates of long-term intense romantic love. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 7(2), 145–159. https://doi.org/10.1093/scan/nsq092
Dopamine affects how brain decides whether a goal is worth the effort. (2020, March 30). National Institutes of Health (NIH). https://www.nih.gov/news-events/nih-research-matters/dopamine-affects-how-brain-decides-whether-goal-worth-effort
Logue, S. F., & Gould, T. J. (2014). The neural and genetic basis of executive function: Attention, cognitive flexibility, and response inhibition. Pharmacology, Biochemistry, and Behavior, 0, 45–54. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pbb.2013.08.007
Neurotransmitter | definition, signaling, & types | britannica. (n.d.). Retrieved February 19, 2022, from https://www.britannica.com/science/neurotransmitter
