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Word for something like an addiction that you don't miss or crave when it's actually gone


Addiction is defined as "the state of being enslaved to a habit or practice or to something that is psychologically or physically habit-forming, as narcotics, to such an extent that its cessation causes severe trauma." But sometimes a person will find something which they do not suffer any withdrawal from when the y stop doing it for a while, and they do not feel any great need to seek out on your own. Yet when they are actively engaged with it, they just do not want to stop and can find it very difficult to pull themselves away from.


As an example, "My son is addicted to MineCraft. Once he sits down at it he will play for hours, not even wanting to stop to eat or sleep even when all his friends have gone home. Yet unless one of his friends wants to play it with him to begin with he never touches it."


I feel like "addicted" is the wrong word, because while the "psychological enslavement" part is correct, it does not seem to form a habit or exhibit withdrawal symptoms. It's almost like a temporary addiction that goes away whenever the stimuli is removed. Is there a word for this?



Answer



Consider, fixation or fixated



Fixate: To attend to something to the exclusion of all others



Taken literally it describes only the actions a person is performing, not their mental state whilst doing so. It is possible for a person to be fixated by choice, or to be mesmerized.


Unlike addicted it does not imply a serious mental or physical dependence on an activity or substance, but rather a temporary state of mind.


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