conversion reaction
1
9.3
- noun
- /kənˈvɜrʒən riˈækʃən/
- Archaic
:
reacción de conversión
- The doctor diagnosed her with a conversion reaction.
Examples
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The patient’s sudden blindness was diagnosed as a conversion reaction resulting from acute emotional stress.
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After her traumatic experience, she developed a conversion reaction and lost sensation in her legs.
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Doctors ruled out any physical causes for his paralysis, concluding it was a conversion reaction.
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Many patients experience conversion reactions without realizing it.
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The patient experienced a conversion reaction, displaying paralysis despite no physical injuries.
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During the therapy session, the psychologist explained how a conversion reaction can cause loss of sensation in a limb.
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The doctor diagnosed her with a conversion reaction after ruling out any medical causes for her symptoms.
Synonyms
2
7.8
A condition where emotional stress causes loss of movement or feeling without a medical cause
A condition where strong emotions cause physical symptoms without a medical cause
Physical symptoms, like pain, that come from stress or strong emotions without a medical reason
Surface Forms
Morphology
The constituents 'conversion' (a transformation, here specifically of emotional stress into somatic symptoms) and 'reaction' (a response) give a compositional clue that this is a response involving conversion, so there is some predictable relation. However, the expression names a specialized clinical disorder and requires domain knowledge to map the parts onto the specific psychiatric meaning, so a B1 learner would only partially infer the sense without prior exposure.
Etymology
Conversion reaction comes from the idea of conversion as 'turning' feelings into body problems and reaction as a 'response'. It creates a picture of the mind 'turning' emotional pain into real body symptoms, so the phrase means 'physical symptoms' caused by emotional stress rather than by a medical illness.