pathologize

English

Alternative forms

• pathologise

Etymology

pathology +‎ -ize

Verb

pathologize (third-person singular simple present pathologizes, present participle pathologizing, simple past and past participle pathologized)

1. (transitive) To characterize as a pathology or disease; to characterize (a person) as suffering from a disease.

   Some childhood behavior has been pathologized as attention-deficit disorder.

   • 2001 Dec. 16, Melanie Thernstrom, "Pain, the Disease," New York Times (retrieved 12 July 2011):

     Many pain patients have had doctors who pathologized them, told them their pain was unreal.

   • 2007 July 23, Rachel Endo, "Inbox," Time:

     To pathologize China's industries as corrupt not only reeks of centuries-old Yellow Peril rhetoric but also fails to acknowledge the shortcomings of transnational regulations.

   • 2009, Joseph G. Ponterotto et al., Handbook of Multicultural Counseling, ISBN 9781412964326, p. 142:

     My automatic reaction was to deal with the anxiety he evoked in me by pathologizing him as paranoid and obsessive compulsive.