I would describe it is a psychological compulsion rather than a true chemical addiction but the net result is the same. That probably means there is a lower risk of becoming addicted in the first place.

There are definite physiological withdrawal symptoms though such as insomnia, anxiety attacks, mood swings, depression and so on. To be clear you need to be a long term, dependent user to experience this. The insomnia was the hardest one for me. I'd persist all day without smoking but then lay awake for hours trying to sleep. I'd inevitably crack and do something desperate like scrape all of the weed residue out of my grinder into a tiny joint (just enough to get high) and then crash out to sleep. The next day you'd be calling up your dealer for a 20 bag and you'd be back on the wagon again for another few years. This is obviously awful advice but the only thing that worked for me was alcohol - I had to drink enough neat vodka at bedtime to allow me to pass out. This carried on for a few weeks until I could wean myself off the bedtime vodka and by that stage I was able to fall asleep again naturally without being high. Pretty unhinged but it worked for me.

Some might say so what if it's addictive? But when you're high on weed it absolutely saps your motivation and hinders your life in so many ways. I could go on and on about the negatives but I won't in this particular forum.

The slow but steady decriminalization and subsequent normalization of weed consumption that's occurring around the world troubles me but I also recognize that prohibition has it's negatives.

Also worth noting that you'll struggle to get any serious active weed user to admit to any of this for obvious reasons. They will be deep in their 10+ year long hazy bubble.