susceptibility

American  

[suh-sep-tuh-bil-i-tee] / səˌsɛp təˈbɪl ɪ ti /

noun

susceptibilities plural

1. state or character of being susceptible.

   susceptibility to disease.

2. capacity for receiving mental or moral impressions; tendency to be emotionally affected.

3. susceptibilities, capacities for emotion; feelings.

   His susceptibilities are easily wounded.

4. Electricity.

   1. electric susceptibility.

   2. magnetic susceptibility.

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susceptibility British  

/ səˌsɛptəˈbɪlɪtɪ /

noun

1. the quality or condition of being susceptible

2. the ability or tendency to be impressed by emotional feelings; sensitivity

3. (plural) emotional sensibilities; feelings

4. physics

   1. Also called: electric susceptibility.   Χ.  (of a dielectric) the amount by which the relative permittivity differs from unity

   2.  Κ.  Also called: magnetic susceptibility.  (of a magnetic medium) the amount by which the relative permeability differs from unity

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Synonym Usage

See sensibility.

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• nonsusceptibility
  noun
• oversusceptibility
  noun
• presusceptibility
  noun
• unsusceptibility
  noun

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• susceptibilities
  plural

Etymology

Origin of susceptibility

First recorded in 1635–45; from Medieval Latin susceptibilitās, equivalent to susceptibilis(is) susceptible + -itās- -ity

Explanation

Susceptibility is a tendency to be affected by something. Some people have a greater susceptibility to colds than others. A susceptibility is a type of weakness, but a particular kind. If your knee keeps getting injured, you may have a susceptibility to knee problems. If alcoholism runs in your family, you probably have a susceptibility to being an alcoholic yourself. Some people have a susceptibility to spending a lot of money or eating too much. When you have a susceptibility, there's something you can't resist or can't fight off.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

susceptibility susceptibilities

Pandemics happen with regularity due to little things like the susceptibility of the human body to illness and international trade and travel.

From Salon ● May 11, 2026

A lack of trust in government and health systems in the UK "underlaid susceptibility to false information", it added, and said action was needed to rebuild public trust in vaccines more generally.

From BBC ● Apr. 16, 2026

"Our data shows that this approach could have serious unintended consequences later in life, increasing susceptibility to chronic liver inflammation, fibrosis and cancer."

From Science Daily ● Mar. 23, 2026

Just as important, I’m using AI to tame my human susceptibility to praise, so that when I do get a sycophantic response to my prompts, I take it with a hearty grain of salt.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 21, 2026

In 2004 two U.S. anthropologists and a Venezuelan medical researcher proposed that Native American susceptibility to infectious disease might have a second cause: helper-T cells, which like HLAs help the immune system recognize foreign objects.

From "1491" by Charles C. Mann

He is one of the 90% of people with so-called idiopathic disease: Their Parkinson’s has no clear genetic cause but almost certainly results from some combination of ill-defined genetic susceptibilities and environmental triggers.

From Science Magazine ● May 4, 2023

Social media, he says, exacerbate some dangerous susceptibilities — to demagoguery and moral vanity — that are neither new nor entirely expungable.

From Washington Post ● Dec. 31, 2021

Jeff Bardin, the chief intelligence officer at cybersecurity firm Treadstone 71, told Fox News that almost immediately after Soleimani's death, Iranian hackers began infiltrating U.S. city websites, searching for susceptibilities.

From Fox News ● Jan. 3, 2020

Without the plant host susceptibilities, the pathogen would starve before the plant got sick.

From Salon ● Jul. 29, 2018

Every undergraduate, in proportion to his susceptibilities and capacities, comes under the influence of the social and intellectual traditions of Oxford, which are the traditions of centuries of the best English life.

From An American at Oxford by Corbin, John