Noun

Singular anxiety

Plural anxieties

anxiety (plural anxieties)

1. An unpleasant state of mental uneasiness or concern about some uncertain event.
   • 2005, Plato, Sophist. Translation by Lesley Brown. 268a.

     But the other, because he's been immersed in arguments, gives the appearance of harbouring considerable anxiety and suspicion that he's ignorant of those matters he presents himself to others as an expert on.

2. An uneasy or distressing desire (for something).

   I was anxious to get into the office before Henderson called from New York.

3. (pathology) A state of restlessness and agitation, often accompanied by a distressing sense of oppression or tightness in the stomach.

Synonyms

• care; solicitude; foreboding; uneasiness; perplexity; disquietude; disquiet; trouble; apprehension; restlessness; distress.

Related terms

• anguish
• anger
• anxious

Anxiety is a psychological and physiological state characterized by cognitive, somatic, emotional, and behavioral components. These components combine to create an unpleasant feeling that is typically associated with uneasiness, fear, or worry. Anxiety is a generalized mood condition that occurs without an identifiable triggering stimulus. As such, it is distinguished from fear, which occurs in the presence of an observed threat. Additionally, fear is related to the specific behaviors of escape and avoidance, whereas anxiety is the result of threats that are perceived to be uncontrollable or unavoidable.

Another view is that anxiety is "a future-oriented mood state in which one is ready or prepared to attempt to cope with upcoming negative events" suggesting that it is a distinction between future vs. present dangers that divides anxiety and fear. Anxiety is considered to be a normal reaction to stress. It may help a person to deal with a difficult situation, for example at work or at school, by prompting one to cope with it. When anxiety becomes excessive, it may fall under the classification of an anxiety disorder.

Anxiety is a physiological state characterized by cognitive, somatic, emotional, and behavioral components (Seligman, Walker & Rosenhan, 2001). These components combine to create the feelings that we typically recognize as fear, apprehension, or worry. Anxiety is often accompanied by physical sensations such as heart palpitations, nausea, chest pain, shortness of breath, stomach aches, or headache. The cognitive component entails expectation of a diffuse and certain danger.

Sourced

• Almost all men are over-anxious. No sooner do they enter the world than they lose that taste for natural and simple pleasures so remarkable in early life. Every hour do they ask themselves what progress they have made in the pursuit of wealth or honor; and on they go as their fathers went before them, till, weary and sick at heart, they look back with a sigh of regret to the golden time of their childhood.
  • Samuel Rogers, Italy: A Poem (1830), [1]

Unsourced

• Better to be despised for too anxious apprehensions than ruined by too confident a security.
  • Edmund Burke

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Tue Feb 9 15:05:29 2010