Catastrophism

noun

noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    The doctrine that sudden catastrophes, rather than continuous change, cause the main features of the Earth's crust. countable, uncountable
  2. 2
    The doctrine that, in addition to the more gradual effects of evolution, huge catastrophic events shape the earth's flora and fauna by causing major die-offs which make way for the emergence of new organisms. countable, uncountable
  3. 3
    The practice or tendency of catastrophizing, regarding bad things as catastrophic. countable, uncountable

    "A therapeutic programme based on pain education showed significant improvements regarding pain intensity, disability, catastrophism, depression, anxiety and health, with few positive results on anguish and cognition."

Example

More examples

"A therapeutic programme based on pain education showed significant improvements regarding pain intensity, disability, catastrophism, depression, anxiety and health, with few positive results on anguish and cognition."

Etymology

From catastrophe + -ism, coined by English polymath William Whewell in 1837.

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.