habituation
ha·bit·u·a·tion [ -ˌbi-chə-ˈwā-shən]
[-ˌbi-chə-ˈwā-shən]
2a : tolerance to the effects of a drug acquired through continued use
b : psychological dependence on a drug after a period of use — compare addiction 3 : decrease in responsiveness upon repeated exposure to a stimulus
Recent Examples on the Web
//Tourists make a difference by joining rhino or lion conservationists at work in South Africa or accompanying researchers working on a chimpanzee habituation project in Kibale National Park in Uganda.
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Kitson Jazynka, National Geographic, "17 unforgettable African safaris," 14 June 2019
//But how could habituation happen in unicellular organisms without neurons?
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Katia Moskvitch, WIRED, "Slime Molds Remember—But Do They Learn?," 14 July 2018
//Instead, the novel is an ode to the clumsier physicality of companionship, where bonds of friendship and love strain against the entropic forces of distance, irritation and habituation.
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Alexandra Kleeman, New York Times, "Fluid Friendships: A Literary Ode to the Shifting Nature of Human Bonds," 8 June 2018
//In 2014, Monica Gagliano, an evolutionary ecologist at the University of Western Australia in Perth, found that Mimosa plants can retain their habituation for at least a month.
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Eoin O'carroll, The Christian Science Monitor, "What slime molds can teach us about thinking," 12 Apr. 2018
//When everyone connects and reads and works and plays on a smartphone.
* * *
Apple’s announcement revealed two new approaches to manage its fall into habituation.
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Ian Bogost, The Atlantic, "The Empire of Apple," 12 Sep. 2017
//But that can also come with risk of habituation and abuse.
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Mandy Oaklander, Time, "New Hope for Depression," 27 July 2017
//The researchers wanted to see if age, habituation, or training influenced the dog's tendency to follow a human's gaze.
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Enikő Kubinyi, National Geographic, "One More Reason Dogs Are More Like Us Than We Thought," 31 Aug. 2016
//But through habituation, or paucity of talent, or lack of originality, most of us, writing, reach for the most workaday speech-tools, and in this way the world is made dull.
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George Saunders, The New Yorker, "Grace Paley, the Saint of Seeing," 3 Mar. 2017
First Known Use of habituation
15th century, in the meaning defined at sense 1
Dictionary Entries near habituation