STRESS

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does stress mean? 

• STRESS (noun)
  The noun STRESS has 5 senses:

1. the relative prominence of a syllable or musical note (especially with regard to stress or pitch)

2. (psychology) a state of mental or emotional strain or suspense

3. special emphasis attached to something

4. difficulty that causes worry or emotional tension

5. (physics) force that produces strain on a physical body

  Familiarity information: STRESS used as a noun is common.

• STRESS (verb)
  The verb STRESS has 3 senses:

1. to stress, single out as important

2. put stress on; utter with an accent

3. test the limits of

  Familiarity information: STRESS used as a verb is uncommon.

 Dictionary entry details 

• STRESS (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

The relative prominence of a syllable or musical note (especially with regard to stress or pitch)

Classified under:

Nouns denoting communicative processes and contents

Synonyms:

accent; emphasis; stress

Context example:

he put the stress on the wrong syllable

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

inflection; prosody (the patterns of stress and intonation in a language)

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

pitch accent; tonic accent (emphasis that results from pitch rather than loudness)

word accent; word stress (the distribution of stresses within a polysyllabic word)

sentence stress (the distribution of stresses within a sentence)

accentuation (the use or application of an accent; the relative prominence of syllables in a phrase or utterance)

Derivation:

stress (put stress on; utter with an accent)

Sense 2

Meaning:

(psychology) a state of mental or emotional strain or suspense

Classified under:

Nouns denoting stable states of affairs

Synonyms:

stress; tenseness; tension

Context example:

stress is a vasoconstrictor

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

mental strain; nervous strain; strain ((psychology) nervousness resulting from mental stress)

Domain category:

psychological science; psychology (the science of mental life)

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

yips (nervous tension that causes an athlete to fail (especially causes golfers to miss short putts))

breaking point ((psychology) stress at which a person breaks down or a situation becomes crucial)

Derivation:

stress (test the limits of)

Sense 3

Meaning:

Special emphasis attached to something

Classified under:

Nouns denoting stable states of affairs

Synonyms:

focus; stress

Context example:

the stress was more on accuracy than on speed

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

accent; emphasis (special importance or significance)

Derivation:

stress (to stress, single out as important)

Sense 4

Meaning:

Difficulty that causes worry or emotional tension

Classified under:

Nouns denoting stable states of affairs

Synonyms:

strain; stress

Context example:

he presided over the economy during the period of the greatest stress and danger

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

difficulty (a condition or state of affairs almost beyond one's ability to deal with and requiring great effort to bear or overcome)

Derivation:

stress (test the limits of)

Sense 5

Meaning:

(physics) force that produces strain on a physical body

Classified under:

Nouns denoting natural phenomena

Context example:

the intensity of stress is expressed in units of force divided by units of area

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

force ((physics) the influence that produces a change in a physical quantity)

Domain category:

natural philosophy; physics (the science of matter and energy and their interactions)

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

tension ((physics) a stress that produces an elongation of an elastic physical body)

breaking point (the degree of tension or stress at which something breaks)

• STRESS (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they stress    ... he / she / it stresses   
Past simple: stressed   
Past participle: stressed   
-ing form: stressing   

Sense 1

Meaning:

To stress, single out as important

Classified under:

Verbs of telling, asking, ordering, singing

Synonyms:

accent; accentuate; emphasise; emphasize; punctuate; stress

Context example:

Dr. Jones emphasizes exercise in addition to a change in diet

Hypernyms (to "stress" is one way to...):

evince; express; show (give expression to)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "stress"):

background; downplay; play down (understate the importance or quality of)

emphasise; emphasize; underline; underscore (give extra weight to (a communication))

drive home; press home; ram home (make clear by special emphasis and try to convince somebody of something)

point up (emphasize, especially by identification)

topicalize (emphasize by putting heavy stress on or by moving to the front of the sentence)

bear down (pay special attention to)

re-emphasise; re-emphasize (emphasize anew)

bring out; set off (direct attention to, as if by means of contrast)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Something ----s something
Somebody ----s that CLAUSE

Derivation:

stress (special emphasis attached to something)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Put stress on; utter with an accent

Classified under:

Verbs of telling, asking, ordering, singing

Synonyms:

accent; accentuate; stress

Context example:

In Farsi, you accent the last syllable of each word

Hypernyms (to "stress" is one way to...):

articulate; enounce; enunciate; pronounce; say; sound out (speak, pronounce, or utter in a certain way)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Derivation:

stress (the relative prominence of a syllable or musical note (especially with regard to stress or pitch))

Sense 3

Meaning:

Test the limits of

Classified under:

Verbs of feeling

Synonyms:

strain; stress; try

Context example:

You are trying my patience!

Hypernyms (to "stress" is one way to...):

afflict (cause great unhappiness for; distress)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "stress"):

rack (stretch to the limits)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Something ----s something

Derivation:

stress ((psychology) a state of mental or emotional strain or suspense)

stress (difficulty that causes worry or emotional tension)

stressor (any agent that causes stress to an organism)

 Context examples 

The test uses ultraviolet light to measure stress hormones in a drop of blood, sweat, urine or saliva.

(Engineers create a simple test that can measure stress, National Science Foundation)

It also helps determine how we handle stress, relate to others, and make choices.

(Mental Health, NIH)

Feelings of fear, dread, and uneasiness that may occur as a reaction to stress.

(Anxiety, NCI Dictionary)

Many factors can affect your heart's rhythm, such as having had a heart attack, smoking, congenital heart defects, and stress.

(Arrhythmia, NIH: National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute)

Stress doesn't cause acne, but stress can make it worse.

(Acne, NIH: National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases)

Your life experiences, such as stress or a history of abuse, may also matter.

(Mental Disorders, NIH)

Being under stress weakens the immune system, and I see how very busy you are now, so I feel you might be feeling a lot of tension.

(AstrologyZone.com, by Susan Miller)

This can cause great stress for family members who must care for them.

(Alzheimer's Disease, NIH: National Institute on Aging)

BAG1 may suppress GADD34-mediated stress responses, have a role in cell survival, and be involved in developmental processes that require cell death.

(BAG1 Protein, NCI Thesaurus)

This protein plays a role in the modulation of signaling during hypoxic stress and angiogenesis.

(Angiopoietin-Related Protein 4, NCI Thesaurus)