passivity
Americannoun
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Also passiveness the state or condition of being passive.
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chemical inactivity, especially the resistance to corrosion of certain metals when covered with a coherent oxide layer.
Etymology
Origin of passivity
Explanation
Passivity is allowing others to do things to you without complaining or pushing back. The baby-sitter's passivity led her charges to walk all over her. They stayed up all night and tied her to the chair, and all she said was, "Please stop misbehaving." You'd use the noun passivity to refer to the state of being passive — passivity applies to someone who accepts the actions or opinions of others without speaking up. Passivity can help you from getting into a fight but that same passivity can mean you might also get a black eye.
Vocabulary lists containing passivity
Unit 3: Compelling Evidence
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Elie Wiesel's "Hope, Despair and Memory" (1986)
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The Bluest Eye
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
The shah had offered cultural freedom and economic opportunity, hoping for political passivity but getting mass demonstrations instead.
From The Wall Street Journal • Jan. 8, 2026
At first I couldn’t come up with even a basic story idea, but in a stroke of visionary passivity, I outsourced the job to Sora’s famous cousin, ChatGPT.
From Barron's • Dec. 12, 2025
I’m willing to blame some of that passivity on his head injury, but it’s hard to care about a character who only has a personality for three minutes.
From Los Angeles Times • Sep. 19, 2025
This claim of passivity kidded nobody except maybe himself.
From Slate • Jun. 16, 2025
Being a suppression, not merely a repression, it produced not frustration, but something more ominous, perhaps, in the long rim: passivity.
From "The Left Hand of Darkness" by Ursula K. Le Guin
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
