The word of the day for October 5th.
Today's word is perseverate, spelled P-E-R-S-E-V-E-R-A-T-E.
Perseverate is a verb.
To perseverate is to intently focus one's attention on a thought or thoughts.
Perseverate can also mean to recur or repeat continually.
Here's the word used in a sentence from the Minnesota Star Tribune.
Why do we remember the close losses more than the wins?
We perseverate on Milwaukee's 24-point comeback with 10 minutes left in the fourth quarter,
but forgot the Wolves trailed by 16 with less than five minutes to play before beating Houston earlier this year.
Looking at perseverate and perseveration, you may guess that the latter was formed by adding a suffix to the former.
But that's not the case.
Perseveration is actually the older term by a few years.
In the early 1900s,
psychologists adopted perseveration from German for the act of repeating a behavior over and over again.
For instance, continually repeating the same syllable or word might be called verbal perseveration.
Shortly afterward, those scientists wanted a verb for such acts of repetition,
so they changed the A-T-I-O-N of perseveration to A-T-E, and perseverate was born.
Perseverate continued to evolve and persevere in the English language,
which led to its broader meanings to recur or repeat continually and to fixate.
With your word of the day, I'm Peter Sokolowski.