gaslighting

1. 1
   noununcountable

   Gerund of gaslight.

   The therapist helped her recognize the gaslighting that had shaped her marriage.

   Critics called the agency's denial, in the face of its own records, a form of institutional gaslighting.

   Note

   As a noun it usually names the behavior as a whole, so it is mostly uncountable, though the plural gaslightings does turn up for separate episodes. A modifier often sets the scene: institutional gaslighting, or legal gaslighting, as a watchdog group called official denials about who was running DOGE in 2025. It reaches well beyond marriages and families to agencies, companies and governments.

2. 2
   verb

   Present participle and gerund of gaslight.

   He was gaslighting his staff, insisting they had never been told about the deadline he set.

   Accused of gaslighting voters, the campaign denied ever making the promise on tape.

   Note

   The verbal -ing form follows be in progressive tenses (he was gaslighting his staff) and takes the person or group misled as its direct object. It also comes after verbs such as stop, keep and accuse of. Strictly it means undermining someone's trust in their own memory or perception; using it for any plain lie is nonstandard, and careful writers avoid that looser sense.

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