hysteria

/hɪˈstɛriə/

/hɪˈstɛriə/

Other forms: hysterias

Hysteria is a medical condition or general state of extreme fear and panic. When hysteria sets in, people are out of control.

In a medical sense, people who are feeling hysteria may be violent and having trouble perceiving reality. In a more general sense, when someone is hysterical, they're out of control — freaking out. Hysteria is the opposite of calmness. It's really a state of emotional chaos that often takes over during natural disasters and scary moments. Or if you're a 13 year old girl, when you go to a concert for your favorite boy band.

Definitions of hysteria

1. noun

   state of violent mental agitation
   synonyms: craze, delirium, frenzy, fury

   types:

   nympholepsy

   a frenzy of emotion; as for something unattainable

   epidemic hysertia, mass hysteria

   a condition in which a large group of people exhibit the same state of violent mental agitation

   type of:

   mania, manic disorder

   a mood disorder; an affective disorder in which the victim tends to respond excessively and sometimes violently
2. noun

   excessive or uncontrollable fear
   type of:

   fear, fearfulness, fright

   an emotion experienced in anticipation of some specific pain or danger (usually accompanied by a desire to flee or fight)
3. noun

   neurotic disorder characterized by violent emotional outbreaks and disturbances of sensory and motor functions
   synonyms: hysterical neurosis

   types:

   anxiety hysteria

   a form of hysteria having features of both conversion disorder and anxiety neurosis

   hysterocatalepsy

   hysteria with cataleptic symptoms

   type of:

   neurosis, neuroticism, psychoneurosis

   a mental or personality disturbance not attributable to any known neurological or organic dysfunction