reality testing

American  

noun

Psychiatry.

1. the objective evaluation of situations, defective in certain psychoses, that enable one to distinguish between the external and the internal worlds and between the self and the nonself.

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Etymology

Origin of reality testing

First recorded in 1920–25

Example Sentences

Our ability to engage in reality testing could be greatly impaired, if not lost altogether.

From Salon • Dec. 13, 2025

“In reality, testing reflected extremely low levels of PCBs in this school.”

From Reuters • Jul. 28, 2021

Each theme is an opportunity to perform the vital task of reality testing.

From Slate • May 28, 2018

Novelists have the tools to rearrange our reality, testing the limits of things we take for granted — politics, technology, gender, nature — and twisting them into new shapes.

From Los Angeles Times • Jan. 12, 2018

This awareness, reflected on, sometimes shared with a responsible other for reality testing, offers us opportunity for broadening our meaning base, for becoming more—more in accord with our potential for humanness.

From Humanistic Nursing by Paterson, Josephine G.