Is self-injury addictive?
Most self-injury researchers agree that self-injury does show some addictive qualities and may serve as a form of self-medication for some individuals. In our recent research with college students, a significant number of individuals who practice self-injury report having a difficult time controlling their urge to self-injure and interviews conducted for several of the studies associated with this project shows that many self-injurers describe both the immediate effect and overall practice as something with addictive properties. For example, many interviewees talk about moments of feeling the strong need to injure even when there is no obvious trigger and about having "self-injury free" hours or days. They also liken it to other drugs and talk about needing increasingly more or deeper injuries to feel the same effect. Recognition of the addictive properties of self-injury for some individuals is the basis for the "addiction hypothesis" noted by Grossman and Siever (2001) and summarized by Walsh (2005). The addiction theory suggest that self-injurious acts may solicit involvement of the endogenous opioid system (EOS) which regulates both pain perception and levels of endogenous endorphins which occur as a result of injury (Winchel & Stanley, 1991). Overestimation of the EOS can then lead to actual withdrawal symptoms which in turn lead to more self-injurious behavior.