Recently I've been pondering what exactly defines an "Addict". Is it a lack of self-discipline? What if someone is supposedly an addict, because they don't want to give up their habit? If so, we're all addicts in one way or another, even if it is to something so simple as life itself.

The dictionary defines Addict as: One who has become dependant on something.

Then what exactly is Dependant?

Dependant: Rely entirely; live; be contingent.

I don't think anyone relies entirely on anything except oxygen, water and other essential items for survival. Therefore, no one is really an addict to anything but life, unless they choose not to live.

Hmm.. I don't agree. With certain drugs your body becomes physically dependant on them. Eventually an addict doesn't take the drug to get a high but just to feel normal. If you're an addict and you stop taking your drug of choice often the withdrawl symptoms are so severe that you relapse. That's the reason recovering heroine addicts often take methadone. Without the methadone they would be in alot of pain and would probably go back to heroine.

Though there are other addictions, nicotine, food, the internet, coffee, marijuana, alcohol, this is probably one of the more extreme cases. It can also be said that most people are dependant on human interaction to live Human's are social creatures and without interaction from other humans or some sort of companion animals people will often be driven insane (or so films and boks have led me to believe ) and become more likely to hurt themselves.

I have to agree with Jaq. You can become dependent on drugs physiologically, as well as psychologically. A simple but useful definition for "addicted" is when [insert addiction] controls your life to the point where, no matter how worse off you're going to become if you do said addiction, you still do it. For instance, i'm addicted to Final Fantasy. It doesn't seem to matter that I don't have money for it, when it comes out, I'm buying it that day. When it came out online for the PS2, I bought the internet adapter, online service, paying for the monthly subscription, and yet I have the PC version too. I hope this helps.

Well, purely from a drug standpoint, it is a habit that interfers with normal function. A mild example of this is a smoker having a cigarette after meals becuase the body doesn't digest food very quickly with out nicotine when addicted.

Obviously a harsher example would be the withdrawal from heroin.

Psychologically addicting substances do not produce addicts as such (or more the term hasn't been used for thirty years in this respect), they can indirectly interfere with behavioural function, but it doesn't make your body need the drug. However there are mild withdrawal symptoms from extreme and prolonged abuse from some.

There is a medical definition for addiction. To be addictive, a drug must fulfil three criteria:

It must be reinforcing (have a noticeably positive or pleasurable effect)

It must produce tolerance (after prolonged use, the same amount of the drug has less of an effect)

It must have withdrawal symptoms


Interestingly, by at least one standard cigarettes are more addictive than heroin (a quarter of heroin users become addicted, compared to a third of smokers).

My question was in relation to drugs, which cause both physiological and psychological dependancies.

I guess the question of whether or not someone is an addict depends on if they can set themself a time limit, of being off the drug and stick to it.

Commie - that is true for addictive substances, but not the definition of "addiction".

But once again, psychologically addictive drugs, in very basic terms, make you want the drug because it feels nice. Now that's not really the whole of it, but what i'm trying to say is that labeling people with a habit, an addict, isn't correct.

That is exactly my point Juice. Too many people casually use the term addict when it, mostly, is not the case.

Let's not forget the purely pyschologially addictive things. Absolutely seriously, I'm addicted to videogames. I'm not saying that I have to spend every waking hour with a controller in my hand, but if I go several days without playing, I get cranky and short-tempered. My wife's learning that sometimes she just needs to plug me in for an hour to calm me down.

I put it down to the calming effect of losing oneself in something through immersion. A decent game will occupy 100% of the player's attention, and all the cares and stresses of the world are temporarily forgotten. The psychological term for this state is 'flow experience'
Interesting article on flow experience
So I'm addicted to the feelings of flow experience. It fulfils Commie's 3 conditions for an addiction.

Interesting article. You know when your playing a game, perhaps a part you know well or something which is exactly at your skill level? That would be the ultimate time for the 'flow experience' to happen, and often at such parts of a game I do it in a semi-trance state, perhaps finding it hard to remember the details of it immediately afterwards.

And people wonder why Tetris is so addictive...

I agree about using the word addict to much. In my opinion an addict is someone who can not deal with life without the drug. Its body creates a need for it like we need food to live.