12. Chasing Happiness: The Science Behind Survival and Addiction

Why do people in poverty make choices that seem reckless? It’s not about bad decisions—it’s about survival. In this episode, Nigel McFall breaks down the science behind addiction, stress, and coping mechanisms, explaining how poverty rewires the brain and traps people in cycles of hardship.

From dopamine deprivation to the impact of meth addiction, we explore why escape becomes a priority and how real solutions like drug reform and mental health support can break the cycle.

It’s time to stop judging and start fixing the system. We need Unity.

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Transcript

Piecing Together Unity – Chasing Happiness: The Science Behind Survival and Addiction

Kia ora, hello, and welcome to Piecing Together Unity.

I'm Nigel McFall, the founder of the Unity Party, and thanks for joining me today for another conversation.

This episode is called Chasing Happiness: The Science Behind Survival and Addiction.

Too often, people ask, “If someone is struggling to afford food for their kids, why are they spending money on alcohol, vapes, drugs, or even a new pair of shoes they can't afford?” But that question misses the bigger picture. It’s easy to judge from the outside, but survival looks different when you’re the one fighting through it. The reality is far more complex than just bad decisions or irresponsibility. It’s about survival, mental health, and the way our brains function under stress and trauma.

Today, we’re going to break down why people make the choices they do when they’re struggling. Addiction isn’t just about willpower, and financial hardship doesn’t just come from poor decisions. There are deeper forces at play—our brain chemistry, the environments we grow up in, and the systems we live under. And if we really want to solve these issues, we need to stop reacting to the symptoms and start fixing the foundation.

But first, we need to understand why coping mechanisms in poverty look the way they do.

When someone is stuck in poverty, their spending choices aren’t about luxury or recklessness—they’re about getting through the day. Imagine standing in a room filling with smoke. You don’t know where the fire is; you just know you can’t breathe. In that moment, your brain isn’t thinking about next week or even tomorrow—it’s searching for any escape, any relief, just to make it through the next few minutes. When stress is that high, long-term planning doesn’t feel possible. The brain switches into survival mode, and in that state, relief—any relief—becomes the priority.

The brain will grab onto whatever is available. If it’s food, that becomes the coping mechanism. If it’s alcohol, that’s the escape. If it’s cigarettes, vapes, or drugs, that’s what the brain latches onto. The environment plays a huge role in shaping these habits. If fast food is cheap and easy to access, it becomes the comfort. If your friends drink or gamble to unwind, you do too. It’s not about good or bad choices—it’s about what’s there when you need a break from the constant weight of stress.

Many people turn to behaviors like gambling or compulsive spending to cope. These behaviors can provide a temporary sense of relief, a momentary escape from reality, or even a fleeting rush of excitement that helps override stress and worry. The problem is, they often lead to deeper financial and mental health struggles, trapping people in a cycle they can’t easily escape from.

Imagine being trapped in a maze with no clear exit, just endless twists and turns. Every choice you make—every dollar spent, every small indulgence—is like taking another path, hoping that somehow it leads to relief. But the reality is, the maze was designed to keep you lost.

And this isn’t just an opinion or theory—this is something that’s been studied extensively. Researchers have looked into why stress and financial hardship shape behavior, and what they’ve found is eye-opening. The Family Stress Model explains that economic pressure leads to psychological distress, which affects decision-making, parenting, and long-term stability. When stress is a constant presence, it changes how the brain functions. Logical thinking slows down. Fear and impulsivity take over. And when the brain’s reward system is starved of dopamine—the chemical that helps us feel good—it starts looking for ways to replace it.

This explains why people struggling financially often engage in riskier behaviors. It’s not about thrill-seeking; it’s about trying to feel something in a life that has been drained of joy and stability.

Poverty isn’t full of bad people making bad decisions. It’s full of people without the tools, without the resources, without the breathing room to make better choices. If all you’ve ever known is financial struggle, if every decision has been made under pressure, if every risk you’ve taken has been out of desperation rather than ambition, then what does that do to a person? What does that do to entire communities?

The consequences of poverty aren’t just personal—they ripple through generations. A child growing up in constant financial stress isn’t just missing out on opportunities, they’re being shaped by an environment of scarcity. When survival is all you’ve ever known, it’s what you pass down. And until we start addressing this as a systemic issue rather than an individual failing, the cycle will never break.

Not all coping mechanisms involve substances. Gambling, impulsive spending, and other high-risk behaviors can provide that same temporary relief or excitement that substances do. They trigger the brain’s reward system, giving people a sense of control or escape, even if it comes with long-term consequences.

It’s like being stuck in a sinking boat, scooping out water with your hands. You know it won’t stop the boat from sinking, but in that moment, it’s the only thing keeping you afloat.

And then we have meth.

Methamphetamine is one of the most devastating drugs because of how it hijacks the brain’s dopamine system. Meth kicks those doors wide open, flooding the brain with dopamine all at once. The high is intense, but over time, the brain stops making dopamine naturally to compensate. Nothing feels good without meth. Everyday happiness disappears. Even getting sober doesn’t fix it overnight—because the brain’s reward system is broken.

For those with ADHD, the consequences go even further. Because meth impacts the same dopamine pathways that ADHD medication relies on, traditional ADHD treatments often stop working entirely after long-term meth use. The very medications designed to help people focus, regulate emotions, and function in daily life become ineffective, leaving them with even fewer tools for recovery.

This is where emerging research into psychedelics comes in. Substances like psilocybin, the active compound in magic mushrooms, and MDMA have been found to rewire the brain, helping to rebuild the connections that addiction has destroyed. Unlike traditional treatments that focus on managing symptoms, psychedelic therapy is showing promise in actually restoring brain function, offering a real path to recovery for those who have been written off as lost causes. We need to invest in this. We need to invest in the people who want to change, who are desperate for a way out but have no doors to walk through.

And yet, we live in a society that gives plastic bottles more of a second chance than we give people. We recycle materials, repurpose goods, and make conscious efforts to extend the life of objects, but when it comes to humans, we slap a label on them and leave them to fail. We tell people their past defines them, that a bad decision is a permanent mark, that they don’t deserve the opportunity to rebuild. And that mindset is why cycles of poverty, crime, and addiction continue.

We need real drug reform. We need mental health services that actually work. We need a welfare system that lifts people up instead of trapping them in survival mode. We need to build a system that doesn’t just catch people when they fall—but stops them from falling in the first place.

We need Unity.

And that starts today.

Together, we will piece it all together—one idea, one story, and one conversation at a time.