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puerilism. In DICTIOUS you will not only get to know all the dictionary meanings for the word
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English
Etymology
From puerile + -ism.
Noun
puerilism (usually uncountable, plural puerilisms)
- (psychology, psychiatry) Childlike behavior by an adult, especially as indicating a mental disorder.
- 1932, Aubrey Lewis, "The Experience of Time in Mental Disorder," reprinted in Inquiries in Psychiatry (Routledge, 2013), →ISBN, p. 14 (Google preview):
- With regard to hysteria; in dissociation there may be a secondary time disorder; for example a patient with puerilism said: "People all seem grown up and older. And my Mum, I'm sure I know her from a long time ago. I look at her, but I can't make it out."
1962, Walter Laqueur, Young Germany: A History of the German Youth Movement, →ISBN, page xi:he Dutchman Johan Huizenga, who coined the term puerilism in the 1930s . . . defined it as permanent puberty.
2004, John Lukacs, A New Republic: A History of the United States in the Twentieth Century, →ISBN, page 286:A kind of puerilism marked many American attitudes — an unnaturally extended puerilism which tended to transmute itself into senility alarmingly and swiftly.
See also
References
Romanian
Etymology
Borrowed from French puérilisme.
Noun
puerilism n (uncountable)
- puerilism
Declension