factitious
Americanadjective
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not spontaneous or natural; artificial; contrived.
factitious laughter; factitious enthusiasm.
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made; manufactured.
a decoration of factitious flowers and leaves.
adjective
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artificial rather than natural
factitious demands created by the mass media
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not genuine; sham
factitious enthusiasm
Other Word Forms
- factitiously adverb
- factitiousness noun
- nonfactitious adjective
- nonfactitiously adverb
- nonfactitiousness noun
- overfactitious adjective
Etymology
Origin of factitious
First recorded in 1640–50, factitious is from the Latin word factīcius “made by art, artificial.” See fact, -itious
Compare meaning
How does factitious compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:
Explanation
If you create a "diamond" out of plastic, then you’ve created a factitious diamond, meaning that it’s a phony. Factitious, pronounced "fac-TISH-us," means "fake," like a factitious compliment you give the person who cooked you an awful meal — you don't mean it, but you say it anyway, just to be nice. As he or she happily walks away, another friend might whisper, "Were you being facetious about the dinner being good?" Facetious, pronounced "fuh-SEE-shuhs," means "trying to be funny." Don't confuse factitious with facetious — or fictitious, which means "made up."
Vocabulary lists containing factitious
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Make Do: Fac
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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.
Prof Marc Feldman is one of the world's most renowned experts on factitious disorders like Munchausen syndrome.
From BBC • May 7, 2023
According to one study on factitious disorder, half of patients also had borderline personality disorder, while a third showed signs of narcissistic personality disorder.
From Washington Post • Jun. 20, 2016
“The heroic image that cancer survivors increasingly have is attractive to factitious disorder patients,” Marc Feldman writes in his book scholarly Playing Sick.
From The Guardian • Feb. 18, 2016
The myths in them didn’t seem at all factitious.
From The New Yorker • Jan. 14, 1966
I hadn't known what factitious meant, so I looked it up in the dictionary.
From "The Bell Jar" by Sylvia Plath
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.
