Psychology: Guilty pleasures

There are so many. We all have them. Even if we don’t want to admit it. ‘Like what?’ you ask? Well, like staying in bed or having that extra red velvet cup cake when I know I should be watching my weight, or buying yet another pair of black heels – shall I continue?
Most people’s list of delightful distractions is longer than they care to admit. Guilty pleasures are all those tempting, pleasure-deriving things that make us feel indulgent and also bad because somewhere within us there is a nagging voice saying ‘you really shouldn’t’.

The most pleasurable presents seem to come with a consequence– guilt. Many of the things that give us maximum gratification also have layers of self-reproach surrounding them, begging to be discarded. It is a common belief that a lot of these guilty pleasures are just bad for us, hence the remorse. Not all of them are bad of course; some can actually be good for our health such as eating dark chocolate, a love for exercise (ya right) and occasionally sleeping in.
Physiologically, our levels of the two neurotransmitters dopamine and serotonin (‘feel good’ substances secreted by the brain) are raised as we hit the snooze button of our alarm clock or go through a pint of Ben & Jerry’s chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream straight from the container. Bliss.

Sometimes the things we enjoy aren’t always things we like to admit to or even indulge in frequently. Let’s face it, the copy of ‘Fifty Shades of Grey’ we hide behind our intellectual books or the secret crush we have on someone who isn’t thought to be that good looking by worldly standards, are just some of the things we may not tell our friends and peers. Somehow admission isn’t possible, even to ourselves, without feeling a smidgen of shame.

So, where does this guilt come from? Perhaps it comes from the fact guilty pleasures are hidden from others and our reasons for keeping them a secret could be:
• Risk of losing social credibility
• Fear of ridicule
• Being labeled uncool, geeky or just plain weird
There an unsaid rule about conformity that plays a role in our feeling guilty. There seem to be an unprinted instruction manual of shoulds & shouldn’ts in our minds that govern our lives. We should watch our weight, we shouldn’t read that, we shouldn’t eat this, we should be working instead of watching the latest soap opera, we should exercise, we should wake up early and many more principles have been learnt as a result of our up bringing, past experiences and cultural background.

According to professor Linden from John Hopkins School of Medicine, we have evolved into quite complex creatures and therefore are not only driven by primal forces; the main pleasure centre has adapted to involve motivational and emotional factors. That’s why we don’t always strive towards what’s needed or good for us in terms of survival, resulting in a thin line between pleasure and pain.

Worrying about other people’s opinion is also responsible for the guilt we feel when indulging ourselves. If we all admitted to our guilty pleasures and shared them with others we would easily find many who enjoyed the same no matter how obscure and embarrassing it may be.

Maybe there will be no guilt associated with the pleasure once we know others are indulging themselves just like we are. But if we remove the guilt, will we still acquire a similar kind of gratification from these activities? Part of the charm is the twinge of shame we feel when we indulge in them much akin to finding forbidden things all the more tempting.

While some of us feel that guilty pleasures are just little quirks that help us get through the day or week, others see it as hampering productivity. Spending time on Facebook when an exam looms the next day or just watching trash television may come in the way of our doing more constructive activities.

However, life would become quite boring if it wasn’t for these little distractions that adequately lift our mood and provide short-term contentment. We can’t wish for the guilt to disappear because that is the psychological mechanism that helps us from over-indulging. Living without pleasure is for automatons and not human beings. So, to all of life’s little delights and to that deliciously indulgent second helping of the rich chocolate cake – go ahead, plead guilty. After all if we believe in the saying ‘all things in moderation’ then even moderation, from time to time, needs a break.