affluenza

Syllables: af·flu·en·zaUK/ˌæf.luːˈɛn.zə/US/ˌæf.luˈɛn.zə/

affluenza noun: a feeling of dissatisfaction, anxiety, etc., caused by the dogged and ongoing pursuit of more goods and possessions.

Image: Powhusku from Laramie, WY, USA, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun

affluenza (usually uncountable, plural affluenzas)

(usually) A feeling of dissatisfaction, anxiety, etc., caused by the dogged and ongoing pursuit of more goods and possessions.
- The tension heightens when speaking about "affluenza" from within the economic cultures of Western countries and in particular our North American society. We do live quite privileged lives. Our privileges have clearly become expectations. […] Affluenza has been defined as a cultural disease of...2003, Dale P. Andrews, “Preaching a Just Word in Privileged Pulpits: Healing Affluenza”, in André Resner, Jr., editor, Just Preaching: Prophetic Voices for Economic Justice, St. Louis, Mo.: Chalice...
- I think that all moms, no matter what their faith, struggle with the expectations of Affluenza Season, especially with the rosy Norman-Rockwell-type images of happy families shown in commercials starting at 12:01 a.m. the day after Halloween (didn't it use to be the day after Thanksgiving?).2007, René Syler, Karen Moline, “Affluenza Season”, in Good-enough Mother: The Perfectly Imperfect Book of Parenting, New York, N.Y.: Simon Spotlight Entertainment, →ISBN, page 225

அவாநோய், திருக்காய்ச்சல்

The tension heightens when speaking about "affluenza" from within the economic cultures of Western countries and in particular our North American society.2003, Dale P. Andrews, “Preaching a Just Word in Privileged Pulpits: Healing Affluenza”, in André Resner, Jr., editor, Just Preaching...
Many contemporary industrial societies are characterized by the condition some writers call "affluenza".2010, Andrew Brennan, Y. S. Lo, “Beyond Individual Responsibility: Governance and the Affluenzic Society”, in Understanding Environmental...
This minor epidemic of affluenzas does not signal a politics that is, in analytical terms, creative.2010, Kim Humphery, “The New Politics of Consumption”, in Excess: Anti-consumerism in the West, Cambridge; Malden, Mass.: Polity Press...

plural	affluenzas

Blend of affluence + influenza.

What does affluenza mean?: Affluenza means a feeling of dissatisfaction, anxiety, etc., caused by the dogged and ongoing pursuit of more goods and possessions.
What is affluenza in Tamil?: Affluenza in Tamil is அவாநோய், திருக்காய்ச்சல். See Affluenza meaning in Tamil.
How do you use affluenza in a sentence?: The tension heightens when speaking about "affluenza" from within the economic cultures of Western countries and in particular our North American society.
What part of speech is affluenza?: Affluenza is a noun.
How do you pronounce affluenza?: Affluenza is pronounced /ˌæf.luːˈɛn.zə/ (UK).
What is the plural of affluenza?: The plural of affluenza is affluenzas.

Adapted from Wiktionary: affluenza (page history and authors); affluenza (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-au-affluenza.ogg.

Cite this entry: “affluenza.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/affluenza. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.