Word.ws English Dictionary

underassertiveness

underassertiveness noun: a tendency toward being underassertive; social timidity.

Noun

underassertiveness (uncountable)

  1. A tendency toward being underassertive; social timidity.
    • Underassertiveness is a unique type of tranquillity destroyer because we often think that if we just keep our mouths shut, “grin and bear it,” and “turn the other cheek,” we will be better off. True? Absolutely not.2001, Archibald Hart, The Anxiety Cure, →ISBN, page 98
    • While contact offenders had more cognitive distortions and victim empathy distortions, the internet offenders identified more with fictional characters and had increased scores on scales of fantasy and underassertiveness.2011, Gráinne Kirwan, The Psychology of Cyber Crime: Concepts and Principles, →ISBN

Origin of underassertiveness

From under- + assertive + -ness.

Questions about underassertiveness

What does underassertiveness mean?
Underassertiveness means a tendency toward being underassertive; social timidity.
What part of speech is underassertiveness?
Underassertiveness is a noun.

Words near underassertiveness in the dictionary

  1. underarticulating
  2. underarticulation
  3. underascertainment
  4. underassertive
  5. underassertively
  6. underassertiveness
  7. underassess
  8. underassessed
  9. underassesses
  10. underassessing
  11. underassessment

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: underassertiveness (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.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-underassertiveness.wav.

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