addict

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   a person who cannot stop taking a harmful drug

   The clinic helps drug addicts recover.

2. 2
   noun

   a person who likes something so much they cannot stop doing it

   My brother is a complete video game addict.

3. 3
   verb

   to make someone become dependent on something, especially a drug

   The drug can addict users after only a few doses.

Appears in

Simplified etymology

Addict dates from the mid-16th century and ultimately derives from Latin dicere, “to say.” It originally meant “assigned by decree” and thus bound to something; its modern sense dates only from the early 20th century.

Borrowed from Latin addictus, past participle of addīcō (“deliver; devote; surrender”), from ad- (“to, towards, at”) + dīcō (“say; declare”)

Topics

External links

• Google Images
• Cambridge Dictionary
• Wiktionary