[Workaholism--hazardous effect of excessive work involvement]

Reviewing the available literature you can come across different definitions of workaholism. In our opinion workaholism is a specific way of the employee's occupational activity caused by his/her job addiction. An excessive work involvement is one of the aspects of this phenomenon. It is valued by employers very positively. But such an assessment may only apply to a preliminary stage of workaholism development. Looking at this phenomenon from the perspective of years we should evaluate it as hazardous to both an employee and organization. It is a typical end effect of each addiction. Nowadays, conditions facilitating workaholism development have also came out in Poland. Unfortunately we are not ready to cope with it because our theoretical knowledge about this phenomenon, its process of development and effects is incomplete and disordered. This results from the lack of empirical studies on psychological and social factors determining the development of workaholism.