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sexual sadism

a paraphilia in which sexual excitement is achieved by intentional infliction of physical or psychological suffering on another person. The harm may be inflicted on a consenting partner, typically involving mildly injurious bodily suffering combined with humiliation. When practiced with nonconsenting partners, sexual sadism may involve inflicting extensive, permanent, or possibly fatal bodily injury. This activity is likely to be repeated, with the severity of the sadistic acts increasing over time. See also sadism; sadomasochism.

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Psychology term of the day

September 8th 2024

number

number

n. in linguistics, a grammatical classification of nouns, pronouns, and any words in agreement with them according to whether they are singular or plural (or in some languages, dual). In English, number is most commonly expressed by the plural noun ending -s (e.g., boy, boys) and in the inflection of the verb to agree with the number of the subject (e.g., The boy runs; The boys run).