stimulate
Formsstimulates, stimulating, stimulated
- 1To encourage someone or something into greater activity or effort.
Tax cuts are often designed to stimulate the economy.
The open debate stimulated fresh ideas among the participants.
Similarencourage, motivate, provoke, incite, drive
Oppositediscourage, inhibit, dampen, stifle
Note
Behind the word stands a Latin goad: stimulō meant "to urge, goad on", from stimulus, "a sting or prick". That image of a prod from behind still fits. It takes people as readily as abstractions like the economy. Letitia Elizabeth Landon, in Lady Anne Granard (1838), has a rival's obvious preference "only served to stimulate her ladyship", so an obstacle becomes the spur. Its near neighbors are encourage, induce, incite and provoke.
- 2To rouse a living organism or its tissue into functional activity.
Electrical pulses stimulate the nerve, causing the nearby muscle to contract.
Certain hormones stimulate cells to divide more rapidly.
Similararouse, excite, energize, invigorate, animate
Note
The goad turns physiological here, and it reaches the mind and the senses as well as nerves and cells: stimulate my mind and sexually stimulated both belong to this sense. In the passive, an adverb often names the kind of response. What does the stimulating is a stimulus, which may be chemical, electrical or mechanical, and that noun shares the Latin root explained under the "urge into action" meaning. Its opposites are sedate and de-energize.
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Origin
Borrowed from Latin stimulātus, the perfect passive participle of stimulō ('to urge, goad on'), which comes from Latin stimulus ('a sting or prick; a goad').