death wish

noun

(psychoanalysis) an unconscious urge to die

• Syn: ↑death instinct, ↑Thanatos

• Topics: ↑psychoanalysis, ↑analysis, ↑depth psychology

• Hypernyms: ↑urge, ↑impulse

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noun

: the conscious or unconscious desire for the death of another or of oneself

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1. desire for one's own death or for the death of another.

2. Psychiatry. a suicidal desire, manifested by passivity, withdrawal, and absorption in nihilistic thoughts, that may eventually lead to suicidal behavior.

[1910-15]

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death wish noun (psychology)

A wish, conscious or unconscious, for death for oneself or another

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Main Entry: ↑death

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death wish UK US noun [singular]

a feeling of wanting to die

Thesaurus: sadness and unhappiness_synonym

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death wish,

(in Freudian psychology) a wish, either conscious or unconscious, for one's own or someone else's death: »

His hero is a writer whose nature is destructive; at the beginning, we see him with a pronounced death wish which he seems to conquer as he becomes a successful playwright (Malcolm Bradbury).

╂[translation of German Todeswunsch]

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n. a desire for someone's death, esp. an unconscious desire for one's own death. Compare with death instinct

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noun [singular]

: a desire to die

Have you seen the way she drives? She must have a death wish.

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ˈdeath wish [death wish death wishes] noun singular

a desire to die, often that sb is not aware of

•

The number of accidents she gets into, you'd think she had a death wish.