eased

1. 1
   adjective

   Made easier, more relaxed, or less stressed than a previous state.

   The eased restrictions allowed restaurants to reopen at full capacity.

   Her eased manner during the interview reassured the nervous candidate.

   Similarrelaxed, loosened

   Oppositetense

   Note

   Unlike many participial adjectives, this one takes degrees comfortably: more eased, most eased, a bit more eased. Ralph Erskine's Select Sermons (1866) describes a soul "more eased and pleased" than a crowned emperor's, and Eve Langlais's Halfway There (2020) still grades it the same way. Applied to a person, a glance or a manner, it implies relief from an earlier strain: someone eased was tense a moment ago.

2. 2
   verb

   Past participle of ease.

   Interest rates have eased over the past several months.

   The pain was eased by a single dose of the medication.

   Note

   Behind the participle stands a verb with a wide range: freeing someone from worry, lessening pain, giving respite, slackening a line, making a task simpler, or moving something slowly and carefully. Every one of these carries over, so a taut line can be eased off and a heavy load eased into place. With have the participle builds perfect tenses; with be it forms the passive.

3. 3
   adjective

   Soothed or mitigated, as pain, anxiety, or distress.

   Her eased anxiety was visible the moment the results came back normal.

   The patient's eased discomfort allowed the doctors to lower his medication.

   Similarrelieved, alleviated, lessened

   Oppositeheightened, aggravated

   Note

   Here the relief falls on the trouble itself rather than on the person. The construction usually names the remedy: a paroxysm is "most eased" by sitting up and leaning forward, as the Association Medical Journal of 1856 reports, or despair is eased with drugs. Unlike the "relaxed" meaning, the thing described is the pain, the symptom or the distress, not the sufferer.

4. 4
   adjective

   Made less extreme or stringent, as a regulation or standard.

   The eased lending standards allowed more borrowers to qualify for loans.

   Eased emission limits drew sharp criticism from environmental groups.

   Similarrelaxed, loosened, softened

   Oppositestricter

   Note

   Here the participle has become a true adjective, and it shows by taking degrees: requirements can be very eased, and one set of criteria more eased than another. Unlike the plain past participle, which reports that someone loosened something, this use describes the standing condition of a rule: evidentiary requirements before the House Committee on Energy and Commerce in 1984, merger criteria in Zongle Huang and Jiyuan Chen's The Future Development of Competition Framework (2004).

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