Everyone has at least one obsession — the one thing they say they cannot survive without. Whether it is an obsession with food or an embarrassingly guilty pleasure for a boy band that is so obsessive you cannot even remember how it started.

“It’s a kind of urge, image or thought that we find difficult to resist,” said Larry Bates, associate professor of psychology. “It doesn’t necessarily have to be a thought itself. Sometimes it’s just an urge.”

One-third of adults with obsessive compulsive disorder say their symptoms began in childhood, according to healthcentral.com.

“We do know that people that tend to have obsessions tend to be a little bit more perfectionistic (and) generally, were wound a little bit tighter than people that don’t have obsessions,” Bates said. “Some people are kind of born with a hard wiring to develop an anxiety disorder or to develop an obsession or something like that, but it may show itself up in different ways — it may be a phobia or in panic attacks.”

Anxiety disorders, including panic disorders, post-traumatic stress disorder and phobias, are the most common class of disorders present in the general population, according to a study done by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

“I think its (obsessions) probably been around for a long time — it’s just that we are much more aware of it now,” Bates said. “Instead of calling people crazy or something like that, we have an actual diagnosis for disorders. But on the other side of that, we actually know how to treat those things and make it go away, too.”

Today it is much easier to self-diagnose a person by looking up symptoms and watching television shows, but obsessions can become unhealthy.

“Literally when we call it a diagnosis (is when it becomes unhealthy) and the line that you cross when it begins to interfere with your daily life,” Bates said. “It can be social, it can be occupational, academic life, physical life or health — any of those major life areas.”

An obsession can be healthy, but it cannot really be positive because when you are willing to harm others to get what you want that is not right, said sophomore Alex Byam.

“When an obsession begins to interfere with your life it is unhealthy,” Bates said. “For instance, not going on a date because you’re worried about germs from kissing or not going to school because you’re afraid of germs on a desk. Otherwise it’s just an eccentricity that we all have.”

Someone having an obsession says that they are human, and everyone has something they do not think they can live without, said freshman Sydney McLemore.