Episode 278: Dr. John Kelly | The Science of Recovery – What the Research Really Says

About this episode

Dr. John Kelly discusses the science of recovery from addiction and the factors that contribute to sustainable recovery.

What does recovery look like — and how do we measure it? In this episode, we're joined by Dr. John Kelly, one of the world's leading addiction researchers and founder of the Recovery Research Institute at Harvard Medical School, for a deep dive into the science behind what makes recovery possible, sustainable, and real. Dr. Kelly breaks down the difference between remission and recovery, shares what decades of research tells us about who gets better (spoiler: most people do) and unpacks the active ingredients that help people build lives they love. We also get into the language we use around addiction, why it matters more than you think, and what the latest science says about stigma, stages of change, and recovery capital. Whether you are in recovery, supporting someone who is, or working in the field — this episode is packed with hope, science, and practical insight. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🔑 IN THIS EPISODE ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ • What recovery actually means — and how it's different from remission • Why 75% of people with substance use disorder do recover (and what that means for you) • The CHIME model: the 5 active ingredients of lasting recovery → Community |…

People in this episode

Host: Clarissa Kennedy

Guest: Dr. John Kelly

Topics covered

• recovery
• addiction research
• substance use disorder
• stigma
• active ingredients of recovery
• language in addiction

Keywords

• recovery
• addiction
• substance use disorder
• stigma
• CHIME model
• recovery capital
• language

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Recovery Research Institute, Harvard Medical School

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