Abstract
Addiction highlights the problematic question of how human desires and habits denude of rational control over harmful or potentially harmful behavior. It constitutes a chronic relapsing phenomenon typified by an overvaluation or compulsive use of a substance or the experience of an activity of interest. While this may bring about adverse personal, social, and legal consequences, such harms hardly foster a disinterest in the addictive factor. Although addiction is commonly seen as a pathological condition, its nuanced nature runs counter and contrary to this mainstream view. This entry seeks to elucidate the notion of addiction generally, as it pertains to the context of pharmaceuticals in particular, its neurobiological and sociocultural contexts as well as some of the attendant ethical issues.
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Acknowledgments
Michael Afolabi acknowledges the Global Initiative Center for Scientific Research & Development in providing logistical support and the conducive intellectual ambience in which the article was written.
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Afolabi, M.O.S., Umukoro, S. (2016). Addiction. In: ten Have, H. (eds) Encyclopedia of Global Bioethics. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-09483-0_6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-09483-0_6
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