compulsion
/kəmˈpʌlʃ(ə)n
/noun
1 [mass noun] The action or state of forcing or being forced to do something; constraint: the payment was made under compulsion...
- Parliament has since amended the law, in the light of that judgment, to make evidence obtained under compulsion inadmissible.
- If at all they had called her, it had been under compulsion from either the film directors or the producers.
- The property is not seized, but has to be handed over under compulsion, with refusal generally constituting contempt.
Synonyms
obligation, constraint, force, coercion, duress, pressure, pressurization, enforcement, oppression, intimidation;
French force majeure
2An irresistible urge to behave in a certain way: he felt a compulsion to babble on about what had happened...
- Assessments were made using the BDI, and clinician rated obsessions and compulsions for each individual patient.
- The value of the SSRIs to treat the obsessions and compulsions associated with TS remains to be resolved.
- They can sometimes recognize that their obsessions and compulsions are unrealistic.
Synonyms
urge, impulse, need, necessity, desire, longing, motivation, drive;
obsession, fixation, addiction;
temptation, pull
US informal jones
Origin
Late Middle English: via Old French from late Latin compulsio(n-), from compellere 'to drive, force' (see compel).
Rhymes
- Spanish America
- Spanish American
- Spanish-American War
- Spanish bayonet
- Spanish broom
- Spanish chestnut
- Spanish Civil War
- Spanish-Colonial
- Spanish flu
- Spanish fly
- Spanish guitar
- Spanish influenza
- Spanish Inquisition
- Spanish mackerel
- Spanish Main
- Spanish Mission
- Spanish moss
- Spanish needles
- Spanishness
- Spanish omelette
- Spanish onion
- Spanish practice
- Spanish rice
- Spanish Sahara
- Spanish Succession, War of the