ALLEVIATION

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does alleviation mean? 

• ALLEVIATION (noun)
  The noun ALLEVIATION has 2 senses:

1. the feeling that comes when something burdensome is removed or reduced

2. the act of reducing something unpleasant (as pain or annoyance)

  Familiarity information: ALLEVIATION used as a noun is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• ALLEVIATION (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

The feeling that comes when something burdensome is removed or reduced

Classified under:

Nouns denoting feelings and emotions

Synonyms:

alleviation; assuagement; relief

Context example:

as he heard the news he was suddenly flooded with relief

Hypernyms ("alleviation" is a kind of...):

comfort (a feeling of freedom from worry or disappointment)

Derivation:

alleviate (provide physical relief, as from pain)

Sense 2

Meaning:

The act of reducing something unpleasant (as pain or annoyance)

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Synonyms:

alleviation; easement; easing; relief

Context example:

he asked the nurse for relief from the constant pain

Hypernyms ("alleviation" is a kind of...):

decrease; diminution; reduction; step-down (the act of decreasing or reducing something)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "alleviation"):

spasmolysis (the relaxation or relief of muscle spasms)

detente (the easing of tensions or strained relations (especially between nations))

palliation (easing the severity of a pain or a disease without removing the cause)

liberalisation; liberalization; relaxation (the act of making less strict)

decompressing; decompression (relieving pressure (especially bringing a compressed person gradually back to atmospheric pressure))

Derivation:

alleviate (provide physical relief, as from pain)

 Context examples 

This acid forming salt also exerts an expectorant effect by irritating the mucous membranes and is used for alleviation of cough.

(Ammonium Chloride, NCI Thesaurus)

There was no recovering Miss Taylor—nor much likelihood of ceasing to pity her; but a few weeks brought some alleviation to Mr. Woodhouse.

(Emma, by Jane Austen)

It is useless, and the time awfully fails me, to prolong this description; no one has ever suffered such torments, let that suffice; and yet even to these, habit brought—no, not alleviation—but a certain callousness of soul, a certain acquiescence of despair; and my punishment might have gone on for years, but for the last calamity which has now fallen, and which has finally severed me from my own face and nature.

(The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

Marianne had promised to be guided by her mother's opinion, and she submitted to it therefore without opposition, though it proved perfectly different from what she wished and expected, though she felt it to be entirely wrong, formed on mistaken grounds, and that by requiring her longer continuance in London it deprived her of the only possible alleviation of her wretchedness, the personal sympathy of her mother, and doomed her to such society and such scenes as must prevent her ever knowing a moment's rest.

(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)

These were the circumstances and the hopes which gradually brought their alleviation to Sir Thomas, deadening his sense of what was lost, and in part reconciling him to himself; though the anguish arising from the conviction of his own errors in the education of his daughters was never to be entirely done away.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

Whenever the time may come, it must be unwelcome to her and all her friends—but I hope her engagement will have every alleviation that is possible—I mean, as to the character and manners of the family.

(Emma, by Jane Austen)