Dictionary

counteremotion en · NOUN

Etymology

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *ḱe? Proto-Indo-European *ḱóm Proto-Italic *kom Proto-Italic *kom- Proto-Indo-European *-teros Proto-Italic *-teros Proto-Italic *komterosder. Proto-Italic *komterād Latin contrāder. Old French contre- Anglo-Norman countre-bor. Middle English counter- English counter- Proto-Indo-European *h₁éǵʰ Proto-Indo-European *-s Proto-Indo-European *h₁éǵʰs Proto-Italic *eks Latin ex Latin ex- Proto-Indo-European *m(y)ewh₁- Proto-Indo-European *-yeti Proto-Indo-European *-éyeti Proto-Indo-European *m(y)owh₁éyeti Proto-Italic *moweō Latin moveō Latin ēmoveō Vulgar Latin *exmovēre Old French esmovoir Middle French esmouvoir Middle French emotionbor. English emotion English counteremotion From counter- + emotion.

Meanings

1. An emotion which acts in contrast or opposition to another emotion.
   • The counteremotion of anger is serenity, that of fear relaxation. 1996, Dolf Zillmann, “Sequential Dependencies in Emotional Experience and Behavior”, in Emotion: Interdisciplinary Perspectives, page 265:
   • An aggressor experiences a revulsion to hurting his victim, but the discomfort cannot last forever, and eventually a reassuring, energizing counteremotion resets his equilibrium to neutral. 2011, Steven Pinker, The Better Angels of Our Nature, Penguin, published 2012, page 670:
   • He began to feel [...] the elation of money coming his way, the self-congratulation that followed – because the gain was all down to his inspired decisions — and then the almost equal counteremotion of sickening anxiety: a fear that there was some aspect of the trade he hadn't covered, some twist that even he had not foreseen. 2009, Sebastian Faulks, A Week in December:

Forms

Coordinates

counterthought