pressuring

1. 1
   verb

   Present participle and gerund of pressure.

   The lobbyists spent months pressuring lawmakers to change the bill.

   Pressuring employees to skip their breaks can hurt productivity.

   Note

   The verb behind it is transitive, so there is always someone on the receiving end: you pressure a person, a committee, a government. As a gerund it keeps that verbal grip and takes its object directly, as in pressuring employees, with no preposition between. That is the quickest way to tell it from the countable noun, where the person being pushed needs of.

2. 2
   noununcountable

   An act or instance of someone being urged or pushed to do something.

   The relentless pressuring by management eventually wore down the union.

   His pressuring of the committee ultimately backfired and cost him support.

   Similarpressure, coercion, badgering

   Note

   This noun counts, so it can be plural. Louis Calaferte's The Inner Adventure (2003) speaks of stopping "these pressurings on the part of the church," where the plural suggests repeated, separate attempts rather than one steady force. The one doing the pushing comes in with by or on the part of. The person pushed comes in with of, as in his pressuring of the committee.

Showing meanings only. Show all 2