hysteria

[hi-ster-ee-uh, -steer-]

noun

1. an uncontrollable outburst of emotion or fear, often characterized by irrationality, laughter, weeping, etc.

2. Psychoanalysis.,  a psychoneurotic disorder characterized by violent emotional outbreaks, disturbances of sensory and motor functions, and various abnormal effects due to autosuggestion.

3. Psychiatry.,  conversion disorder.

hysteria

/ hɪˈstɪərɪə /

noun

1. a mental disorder characterized by emotional outbursts, susceptibility to autosuggestion, and, often, symptoms such as paralysis that mimic the effects of physical disorders See also conversion disorder

2. any frenzied emotional state, esp of laughter or crying

hysteria

1. A complex neurosis in which psychological conflict is turned into physical symptoms, such as amnesia, blindness, and paralysis, that have no underlying physical cause. Early in his career, Sigmund Freud worked on hysteria.

Other Word Forms

• subhysteria noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of hysteria¹

First recorded in 1795–1805; hyster(ic) + -ia

Word History and Origins

Origin of hysteria¹

C19: from New Latin, from Latin hystericus _hysteric

Example Sentences

She compared photographs of women diagnosed with hysteria, a condition later debunked, with those taken by spiritists who were trying to make photographs of dead people appearing behind grieving relatives.

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In some cases, they have attributed reported health-effects from fume exposure to factors including hyperventilation, jet lag, psychological stress, mass hysteria and malingering.

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"We hear the hysteria about our military pilots allegedly violating rules and somebody's air space," Peskov tells me.

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This led to hysteria, with fans attacking the barriers, shouting and pleading that they were disabled and needed to leave.

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But at the height of anti-communist hysteria, real estate interests, seeing their profits threatened by public housing, launch a successful campaign against it, financing opposition groups that call it “socialist housing.”

Read more on Los Angeles Times

Related Words

• agitation 
• delirium 
• excitement 
• frenzy 
• madness 
• nervousness 
• panic