overdeference

Noun

overdeference (uncountable)

1. Excessive deference.
   • When the question of expulsion was agitated, Lord Finch stepped forward and made attempts to speak in Steele's behalf, but being embarrassed by modesty and overdeference to an assembly in which he had not yet been accustomed to hold forth, he sat down in visible confusion, saying so as to be over...1831, The Law Magazine and Review: A Quarterly Review of Jurisprudence, pages 22–23
   • In such situations, whites often reflect their consciousness of group membership by overdeference which is as embarrassing to Negroes as condescension.1965, Earl H. Bell, John Sirjamaki, Social Foundations of Human Behavior, page 344