Affixes

Many terms in this ending have disparaging or facetious associations and few refer to an addiction in the medical sense. Some common examples are workaholic, a person who compulsively works excessively hard and unusually long hours; chocoholic (less often chocaholic), a person who is excessively fond of chocolate; and shopaholic, a compulsive shopper. Words are often created to meet a momentary need: computerholic, a person who spends too much time in front of a computer (here the initial a of the ending is replaced by the unstressed final er of computer); gymaholic, someone who spends too much time exercising at the gym.