exhibitionist

American  

[ek-suh-bish-uh-nist] / ˌɛk səˈbɪʃ ə nɪst /

noun

1. a person who behaves in ways intended to attract attention or display their powers, personality, etc.

2. Psychiatry. a person with the compulsions of exhibitionism.

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Usage

What does exhibitionist mean? In psychiatry, an exhibitionist is someone who has a compulsion to exhibit, or display, their genitals in public. Exhibitionist can also be used in nonclinical, everyday speech to refer to a show-off or a person who overshares. A popular slang term for exhibitionist is flasher, but keep in mind that a person diagnosed as an exhibitionist has a clinical disorder. Example: She called him an exhibitionist for his tendency to share too much personal information at parties.

Other Word Forms

• exhibitionistic adjective
• exhibitionistically adverb
• nonexhibitionistic adjective
• semiexhibitionist noun

Etymology

Origin of exhibitionist

First recorded in 1815–25; exhibition + -ist

Explanation

An exhibitionist is a person who thrives on getting a lot of attention. If your best friend is an exhibitionist, you're probably used to him suddenly bursting loudly into song in public places. Exhibitionist is a fancy word for "show-off." If you're an exhibitionist, you crave the kind of reaction you get from being the center of attention. In some cases, an exhibitionist gets that attention by taking his or her clothes off in public — a streaker or flasher is also an exhibitionist. The word comes from the Old French exibicion, "show or display," from the Latin exhibere, "to show or present."

Example Sentences

"We live in such a voyeuristic, exhibitionist era that if you are not revealing some of yourself, you're not going to develop a relationship with the audience."

From Salon • Jul. 26, 2023

I probably have always been an exhibitionist, but I've done things that I never thought I could do, and it is because of cancer.

From BBC • Apr. 10, 2023

Not Midjourney, which is free so long as you’re willing to be a bit of an artistic exhibitionist, entering your prompt in one of many public Midjourney Discord channels.

From Slate • Mar. 29, 2023

Only an exhibitionist would want to live in constant public view, although there do seem to be a lot of those around.

From Washington Post • Mar. 28, 2023

Peter Voss, evidently, was little short of an exhibitionist.

From Status Quo by Reynolds, Mack