Dopamine, desire and the Bhagavad-gītā: Why getting what we want never seems enough

We live in perhaps the most efficient desire-producing environment humanity has ever created.

A new notification appears.

We check it.

Another video begins automatically.

An advertisement shows us something we did not know we wanted five seconds earlier.

We buy something, receive a parcel, open it—and soon begin looking for something else.

Why is satisfaction so difficult to sustain?

Modern neuroscience gives us part of the answer through research into dopamine, reward learning and motivation.

More than five thousand years ago, the Bhagavad-gītā approached the problem from another direction: What happens when the mind repeatedly contemplates the objects of desire?

The comparison is fascinating—but we should be careful. The Bhagavad-gītā did not describe dopamine, and neuroscience has not scientifically proved the Gītā.

Rather, two very different systems of knowledge have observed something important about human behaviour: wanting can perpetuate itself.

Dopamine is not simply the “pleasure chemical”

Popular culture often describes dopamine as the brain's “pleasure chemical.”

That is misleading.

Dopamine participates in several processes, including motivation, reinforcement learning, reward prediction and what researchers have described as incentive salience—the process through which particular stimuli become attractive and “wanted” (Berridge & Robinson, 1998; Berridge, 2007).

This helps explain an apparently strange feature of human behaviour:

wanting something and enjoying something are not necessarily the same process.

We can strongly want to check our phone without particularly enjoying what we find.

We can continue scrolling although we are bored.

We can want another purchase although the previous purchase produced little lasting satisfaction.

In addiction research, this distinction between “wanting” and “liking” has become particularly important (Berridge & Robinson, 2016).

The brain can become highly responsive to cues associated with a reward even when the pleasure obtained from that reward does not increase accordingly.

This gives us an interesting psychological doorway into the Bhagavad-gītā.

An ancient description of the desire cycle

In Bhagavad-gītā As It Is 2.62–63, Śrī Kṛṣṇa describes a sequence beginning when a person repeatedly contemplates sense objects.

Śrīla A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupāda's translation begins:

“While contemplating the objects of the senses, a person develops attachment for them…”

The sequence then develops approximately as:

contemplation → attachment → desire → frustration/anger → delusion → loss of discrimination → downfall

(Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupāda, Bhagavad-gītā As It Is, 2.62–63)

This is not a neuroscientific model.

Yet psychologically, its starting point is remarkable.

The problem does not begin when we possess something.

It begins with attention.

We contemplate it.

The attention economy understands this very well

Modern digital platforms compete intensely for human attention.

Social media feeds, online shops, advertising systems and recommendation algorithms continually place potentially rewarding stimuli in front of us.

We see the dress.

The holiday.

The beautiful home.

The successful person.

The body.

The relationship.

The lifestyle.

The notification.

And then we see another.

Repeated exposure matters because desire rarely appears from nowhere.

First something enters awareness.

Then attention remains upon it.

Associations develop.

Anticipation grows.

The object acquires psychological importance.

Eventually:

“I see it” becomes “I want it.”

The language is modern.

The technology is new.

But the human vulnerability is very old.

Why getting It doesn't end the process

We naturally imagine:

“When I get this, I will be satisfied.”

Sometimes we are.

But often only temporarily.

Psychological research on hedonic adaptation suggests that people frequently adapt to positive as well as negative changes. Experiences that initially produce considerable emotional impact can gradually become part of ordinary life (Frederick & Loewenstein, 1999).

The new phone becomes simply our phone.

The new clothes enter the wardrobe.

The promotion becomes our normal job.

Yesterday's luxury becomes today's expectation.

The mind then discovers another object.

This does not mean pleasure is meaningless or that enjoying material life is inherently pathological.

The problem arises when we expect a succession of temporary rewards to provide permanent psychological completion.

Social media makes the cycle almost frictionless

Historically, satisfying an impulse usually required effort.

Today, desire and reward can be separated by seconds.

Bored?

Open an app.

Lonely?

Check notifications.

Uncomfortable?

Watch another video.

Want something?

Buy it immediately.

The behavioural loop becomes extraordinarily short:

cue → wanting → action → reward → new cue

Social-media environments are especially powerful because rewards are often unpredictable.

We do not know exactly what the next swipe will reveal.

Something boring?

Something funny?

A message?

Praise?

Conflict?

A beautiful image?

Something shocking?

The uncertainty itself can sustain repeated checking.

What do the statistics tell us about social media?

The relationship between social media and psychological wellbeing is more complicated than simply saying that “social media is addictive.” However, recent large-scale research shows that problematic social-media use is consistently associated with several forms of psychological distress.

A 2024 systematic review and meta-analysis by Du et al. examined 209 studies involving 252,337 participants across 28 countries. Problematic social-networking use showed moderate positive associations with:

• generalised anxiety: r = 0.388

• social anxiety: r = 0.437

• attachment anxiety: r = 0.345

• fear of missing out (FoMO): r = 0.496

(Du et al., 2024).

The particularly strong relationship with FoMO is interesting in the context of desire. Social media does not merely provide something to consume; it continually shows us what other people are experiencing, possessing, achieving and receiving.

Another 2024 meta-analysis specifically examining Instagram included 37 studies and 14,305 participants. Problematic Instagram use was associated with depression (r = 0.35), anxiety (r = 0.31), and lower wellbeing (r = −0.17) (Sepas et al., 2024).

More recent evidence among students reaches a similar conclusion. A 2025 systematic review and meta-analysis of 32 studies involving 26,166 students found social-media addiction was positively correlated with anxiety (r = 0.31), depression (r = 0.31), loneliness (r = 0.21) and FoMO (r = 0.41), while being negatively associated with self-esteem (r = −0.24) (Jing et al., 2025).

These are associations, not proof of causation. A person experiencing anxiety or loneliness may turn to social media more frequently, while problematic social-media behaviour may also contribute to psychological difficulties. The relationship can operate in both directions.

This distinction is important. The scientific evidence does not justify saying:

“Social media causes depression.”

It supports the more careful conclusion that problematic patterns of social-media use are associated with poorer psychological outcomes.

But what about dopamine and “likes”?

There is also neuroscientific evidence that social feedback interacts with the brain's reward circuitry.

In an influential experiment, Sherman et al. (2016) showed adolescents photographs in a simulated Instagram environment while their brains were scanned using fMRI.

Participants were more likely to “like” photographs when those photographs appeared to have already received many likes. Photographs receiving many likes were also associated with greater activity across several neural regions, including the nucleus accumbens, an important component of reward circuitry.

A subsequent experiment involving adolescents and young adults similarly found that highly liked photographs influenced both behaviour and activity within reward-related neural systems (Sherman et al., 2018).

This does not mean that every notification creates a simple “dopamine hit,” as popular descriptions often claim. Human reward processing is considerably more complex.

What the research does suggest is that social signals—approval, popularity, novelty and anticipation—can acquire motivational significance.

And here the comparison with Bhagavad-gītā 2.62 becomes especially interesting.

Kṛṣṇa's sequence begins not with possession but with contemplation:

attention → attachment → desire.

Modern neuroscience describes reward learning and motivational processes through a completely different scientific framework. Yet both perspectives invite us to examine something easily overlooked:

What happens when attention repeatedly returns to something potentially rewarding?

The algorithm may be modern.

The smartphone may be modern.

The human tendency to contemplate, become attached and desire is not.

The Gītā places responsibility earlier in the chain

This is where Bhagavad-gītā 2.62 becomes particularly interesting psychologically.

If attachment begins with repeated contemplation, then intervention does not have to wait until desire becomes overwhelming.

We can examine what repeatedly occupies attention.

What do I look at every day?

What do I repeatedly imagine?

What do I compare myself with?

Which desires am I continually feeding through attention?

This is much subtler than simply commanding:

“Don't desire.”

The Gītā points us towards the conditions from which desire develops.

But Bhakti Is Not Dopamine Deprivation

A spiritual response can easily become another extreme:

“If pleasure causes attachment, perhaps we should eliminate pleasure.”

That is not an adequate description of bhakti.

Bhakti redirects desire.

The senses are not simply regarded as enemies to be destroyed. Consciousness is gradually given another centre.

Instead of asking only:

“How can I stop wanting?”

bhakti introduces another question:

“What is worthy of my desire?”

Prabhupāda repeatedly explains that Kṛṣṇa consciousness involves engaging the senses in relation to Kṛṣṇa rather than attempting artificially to annihilate sensory activity.

This distinction matters.

Suppression and transformation are not the same thing.

From Kāma to a Different Kind of Desire

The Sanskrit concept kāma can refer to desire, particularly desire directed towards personal sensory gratification.

But bhakti does not propose becoming psychologically empty.

A devotee also desires.

The direction changes.

One may desire to hear about Kṛṣṇa.

To chant.

To serve.

To cook for others.

To create something beautiful as an offering.

To understand.

To remember.

To love.

The question therefore becomes not whether human beings can exist without motivation, but what organises that motivation.

Modern neuroscience can study reward systems.

Bhakti asks what we ultimately choose to make rewarding.

Perhaps the problem is not pleasure but expectation

There is nothing inherently mysterious about enjoying a good meal, beautiful clothes, friendship, music or a comfortable home.

The deeper difficulty may begin when temporary experiences are given an impossible task:

“Make me permanently satisfied.”

No purchase can fulfil that contract.

No social-media reaction can fulfil it.

No achievement can continuously reproduce the emotional intensity of achieving it.

The Bhagavad-gītā therefore asks us to examine not only what we possess but the structure of desire itself.

What happens after one desire is fulfilled?

Does wanting end?

Or does the mind simply select its next object?

The most valuable currency may be attention

Perhaps one of the most contemporary ways to read Bhagavad-gītā 2.62 is through the concept of attention.

What we repeatedly contemplate begins to occupy psychological space.

What occupies psychological space can become emotionally significant.

What becomes emotionally significant can become wanted.

And what becomes intensely wanted can begin directing behaviour.

Modern businesses understand the economic value of attention.

Bhakti understands its spiritual value.

This is why practices such as hearing, chanting and remembering are so central.

They deliberately place attention somewhere.

Mantra, therefore, is not simply about stopping thought.

It is about deciding what deserves repeated remembrance.

The modern world asks continuously:

“What else can I make you want?”

The Bhagavad-gītā asks a radically different question:

“Where is your attention taking you?”

Perhaps lasting freedom does not begin when we finally obtain everything we desire.

Perhaps it begins when we understand how desire is being created in the first place—and consciously choose what deserves our attention.

References

Berridge, K. C. (2007). The debate over dopamine's role in reward: The case for incentive salience. Psychopharmacology, 191, 391–431.

Berridge, K. C., & Robinson, T. E. (1998). What is the role of dopamine in reward: Hedonic impact, reward learning, or incentive salience? Brain Research Reviews, 28(3), 309–369.

Berridge, K. C., & Robinson, T. E. (2016). Liking, wanting, and the incentive-sensitization theory of addiction. American Psychologist, 71(8), 670–679.

Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupāda, A. C. Bhagavad-gītā As It Is. Bhaktivedanta Book Trust. See particularly 2.62–63.

Frederick, S., & Loewenstein, G. (1999). Hedonic adaptation. In D. Kahneman, E. Diener, & N. Schwarz (Eds.), Well-being: The Foundations of Hedonic Psychology (pp. 302–329). Russell Sage Foundation.

Du, M., Zhao, C., Hu, H., Ding, N., He, J., Tian, W., Zhao, W., Lin, X., Liu, G., Chen, W., Wang, S., Wang, P., Xu, D., Shen, X., & Zhang, G. (2024). Association between problematic social networking use and anxiety symptoms: A systematic review and meta-analysis. BMC Psychology, 12, 263. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40359-024-01705-w

Jing, Z., Yang, W., Lei, Z., Junmei, W., Hui, L., & Tianmin, Z. (2025). Correlations between social media addiction and anxiety, depression, FoMO, loneliness and self-esteem among students: A systematic review and meta-analysis. PLOS ONE, 20(9), e0329466. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0329466

Sepas, A., Bangash, A. H., Nielsen, R. E., Yang, W., & El-Hussuna, A. (2024). The association between problematic Instagram use, psychological distress, and well-being: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, 27(9), 641–650. https://doi.org/10.1089/cyber.2023.0222

Sherman, L. E., Payton, A. A., Hernandez, L. M., Greenfield, P. M., & Dapretto, M. (2016). The power of the Like in adolescence: Effects of peer influence on neural and behavioral responses to social media. Psychological Science, 27(7), 1027–1035. https://doi.org/10.1177/0956797616645673

Sherman, L. E., Greenfield, P. M., Hernandez, L. M., & Dapretto, M. (2018). Peer influence via Instagram: Effects on brain and behavior in adolescence and young adulthood. Child Development, 89(1), 37–47.

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