Affectivities

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The emotional states or dispositions of an individual that shape their feelings or responses in various situations
2. The different ways in which emotions and feelings manifest and influence behaviors, actions, and interactions
3. The range of emotional experiences and their impact on a person's social engagements and personal relationships

Etymology: "Affectivities" is the plural of "affectivity," so it names several instances of the quality. The root is "affective," from Latin "affectivus," which goes back to "affectus," the past participle of "afficere," meaning "to act upon" or "to influence." That verb was built from "ad" ("to") and "facere" ("to make"), so its core sense was causal: to make something happen to someone or something. The emotional sense of "affect," a feeling or disposition of the mind, developed later. The noun "affectivity" is a formation built by adding "-ity" to the adjective. It is likely a technical coinage, used mainly in psychology and philosophy when writers needed a term for the capacity to feel. Its use grew most in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and it still appears most often in academic writing.

Synonyms: emotions, feelings, sentiments, moods, passions

Antonyms: indifference, apathy, unemotionality