Two different things get called withdrawal, and it helps to separate them.
The first is a component of how problematic use is measured. The main research scale is built from six things, and one of them is withdrawal: how you feel when you cannot use. If the answer is "very unsettled", that is one of the six signals of a problem, alongside salience, mood modification, tolerance, conflict and relapse. Frequency is not on the list.
The second is what people describe once they stop. A qualitative analysis of over a hundred rebooting journals found the same experience described repeatedly: a period of dropped libido, flattened mood and quiet arousal, which the communities call the flatline. It is consistently reported and has never been formally studied, so its length, its cause and how many people get it are unknown. Any list of "withdrawal symptoms by day" is invented.
Two things are worth doing with this. Treat a flat stretch during a change of habits as commonly reported and not as evidence of damage. And treat persistent low mood as its own problem: two weeks of not caring about anything is depression, and it wants a GP rather than a streak.
Where this comes from
Read the full lesson: The flatline, and what we honestly know →
Sources and how strong they are (3)
- Well establishedThe Problematic Pornography Consumption Scale measures problematic use through the six components of Griffiths' (2005) model - salience, mood modification, tolerance, withdrawal, conflict and relapse. Not every instrument in the field is built this way: the Brief Pornography Screen, which produces the highest prevalence figures quoted at C05 and C06, is a short screen rather than a six-component measure.Bothe et al., The Development of the Problematic Pornography Consumption Scale (PPCS), J Sex Res 2018;55(3):395-406, doi:10.1080/00224499.2017.1291798
- AnecdotalThe "flatline" — a period of dropped libido, mood or arousal during abstinence — is consistently reported in abstinence journals but has never been formally studied.Fernandez et al. 2021
- AnecdotalA qualitative analysis of 104 rebooting abstinence journals found abstinence felt impossible at first and became attainable with cognitive-behavioural strategies plus social support. Self-report only; third variables not ruled out.Fernandez, Kuss & Griffiths 2021, Archives of Sexual Behavior
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