externalize
Americanverb (used with object)
-
externalizes,
present (3rd person singular)
-
externalized,
past participle, past
-
externalizing
present participle
verb
-
to make external; give outward shape to
-
psychol to attribute (one's own feelings) to one's surroundings
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
externalizesimple
-
externalizessimple
-
have externalizedperfect
-
has externalizedperfect
-
am externalizingprogressive
-
are externalizingprogressive
-
is externalizingprogressive
-
have been externalizingperfect progressive
-
has been externalizingperfect progressive
Past
-
externalizedsimple
-
had externalizedperfect
-
was externalizingprogressive
-
were externalizingprogressive
-
had been externalizingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of externalize
Explanation
If you externalize something, you show or express it on the outside. You can externalize your anger at the poor quality of the food at the restaurant, but the other patrons would probably prefer you didn't rant at the waiter in front of them — so would the waiter. Psychologically speaking, externalize is the opposite of internalize. You can externalize your fears in a constructive way by writing about them or drawing them, which will help you make sense of them. This is a much better solution than internalizing your fears, because you need to face them and deal with them once and for all. If you keep them bottled up, it is just like to cause you anxiety.
Vocabulary lists containing externalize
The Shining
Looking to grow your vocabulary? Check out this interactive, curated word list from our team of English language specialists at Vocabulary.com – one of over 17,000 lists we've built to help learners worldwide!
The River
Interested in learning more words like this one? Our team at Vocabulary.com has got you covered! You can review flashcards, quiz yourself, practice spelling, and more – and it's all completely free to use!
Zlata’s Diary
Want to remember this word for good? Start your learning journey today with our library of interactive, themed word lists built by the experts at Vocabulary.com – we'll help you make the most of your study time!
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.
See Examples For:
“The economic pain is worse, but Iran has found a way during the course of the war to externalize that pain,” Batmanghelidj said.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 28, 2026
The unnamed protagonist, known in the scripts as “M,” was so complexly drawn that Weisz is now struggling to externalize the experience of playing her.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 26, 2026
Under my leadership, this council won’t externalize our policymaking authority.
From Seattle Times ● Jan. 4, 2024
The trick, then, was to try to find new ways to externalize that drama for a modern TV audience, as he imagined Rice might have wanted.
From New York Times ● Sep. 30, 2022
“That’s what I mean. You have to tell me everything, externalize it all for me, so I can write it.”
From "The River" by Gary Paulsen
Phthalate exposure is just one way the plastics industry externalizes harms.
From Salon ● Feb. 9, 2024
Berry externalizes Jackie’s depressive state through her shaky camera and desaturated color palette.
From New York Times ● Nov. 25, 2021
The genre externalizes our anxieties and allows us to exorcise their manifestations onscreen.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 12, 2017
I realized this past summer that this friend is self-absorbed and externalizes blame, and that I tend to feel drained in her presence.
From Slate ● Apr. 10, 2017
It is the expression of "inner states" but it externalizes itself in terms of the outer world.
From The Gate of Appreciation Studies in the Relation of Art to Life by Carleton Eldredge Noyes
However, the moment the democracy debate becomes externalized, many Indians become irritated and end up closing ranks against “outsiders.”
From Washington Post ● Apr. 20, 2023
Migration control “is almost completely externalized to Tunisia,” Megerisi said.
From New York Times ● Apr. 5, 2023
That trick relies on incalculable losses that can be externalized from the financial arithmetic, but not from the world itself.
From Slate ● Nov. 26, 2022
He’s made a film where one man’s internal strife has been effectively externalized as an inescapable, picturesque purgatory.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 6, 2022
Here was her humanity externalized, and all her longing—for freedom, from disgust, from the confines of her metal cage.
From "Strange the Dreamer" by Laini Taylor
Much of the current research focuses on depression, while other important outcomes such as anxiety, stress, externalizing behaviors, self-esteem and aggression have received far less attention.
From Science Daily ● Mar. 29, 2026
“A Fantastic Woman” is still a movie that is externalizing a trans experience, because why is she a fantastic woman?
From Salon ● Feb. 24, 2025
This helped him to come to grips with the seismic turns his life was taking and also, by externalizing them, to release some anxiety about them.
From Washington Post ● Apr. 5, 2023
How do we avoid forms of tourism that can advertise low prices because they are exploiting workers, using the dirtiest fuel available, and externalizing the costs of pollution?
From Seattle Times ● Sep. 23, 2022
His motivation had been thalamic rather than cortical and he was having trouble externalizing it verbally.
From A Slave is a Slave by H. Beam Piper
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.
