Addiction science and the perception of freewill

ABSTRACT Do people think individuals with Substance Use Disorder (SUD) have freewill? How does addiction science inform views on the issue? We distinguish between two senses of freewill: 1) libertarian freewill, in which freedom turns on a particular metaphysical conception of action (sometimes operationalized as “could have done otherwise”), and 2) compatibilist freewill, in which freedom depends on the relation between the actor's psychology and her actions (e.g., “was the act what she wanted to do?”). We argue that, in different ways, scientific accounts can impact conceived freewill by linking addictive behavior to mechanisms that observers view as peripheral to the actor (motivation modularity). While a variety of impacts on conceived compatibilist freewill are plausible, we argue that contemporary addiction science has no direct bearing on conceived libertarian freewill. Addiction science may, however, indirectly impact conceived libertarian freewill by priming an explanatory framework in which intention is superfluous (especially materialism).