by Alvinbeo

Created on: August 31, 2009

Upon looking at the word "addiction", the image that might be conjured up in one's image is probably a pale faced, skinny figure in a dark alley smoking marijuana, or injecting heroin, or perhaps snorting cocaine. No thanks to the recent trend of substance abuse cases and of course the media spotlight upon them, the term "addiction" has turned into a rather overwhelming cliche which exudes an aura of negativity to anyone encountering the term. Besides the addiction to substances, there might also be other forms of addictions that have negative connotations as well as positive ones, all of which would be covered in the following paragraphs.

First and foremost, we are going to delve into the kind of addiction which is the primary reason that might single-handedly caused the term "addiction" to become such a negative connotation, the addiction to substances. The substances that might cause addiction ranges from those which are rather still socially acceptable such as caffeine, alcohol, and tobacco to banned substances such as cocaine, opium, and heroine. These substances causes psychological as well as physical dependencies to those who use/consume the substances. Physical dependency means that if the person stops consuming the substance, he/she would experience various withdrawal symptoms (in which the intensity would depend on what the substance is) and he/she would need to consume the said substance again, usually in a gradually increasing amount of consumption each time, to relieve and alleviate him/herself from those withdrawal symptoms. These withdrawal symptoms are ranging from simply drowsiness and/or fatigue to severe ones such as hallucinating, vomiting or death in extreme cases. Psychological dependence is in a sense similar to its physical counterparts in which in both cases, the subject needs to consume the substance repeatedly. However, for this kind of dependency, the effects is more of a placebo effect rather than an actual dependency. One prime example of this can be found among caffeine users (such as coffee drinkers), in which many of us have surely experienced. Despite the common belief that all those addicted to coffee is solely because of the addictive properties of caffeine, I would beg to differ. Based on personal experience as well as general observations, it could be seen that even when one is physically addicted to caffeine, in which the person cannot function on the day without an intake of caffeine, there is still an element of psychological

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