contagion Hear it!

contagion Definition

con·ta·gion (kən tā′jən)

noun

  1. the spreading of disease from one individual to another by direct or indirect contact
  2. any disease thus spread; contagious disease
  3. the causative agent of a communicable disease; bacteria or virus
  4. contagious quality
    1. the spreading of an emotion, idea, custom, etc. from person to person until many are affected the contagion of mirth
    2. the emotion, idea, etc. so spread
  6. a bad influence that tends to spread; corruption

Etymology: ME contagioun < L contagio, a touching < contingere: see contact

contagion Synonyms

contagion

n.

  1. Infection

    transmittal, transmission, communication; see contamination, infection 1.

  2. Communicable disease

    poison, virus, illness; see disease.

contagion Finance Definition
Unanticipated negative events in one market or region that may spread to another market or region. Contagion often is a concern in emerging markets, where one country’s poor economic performance, high inflation, or lack of investor confidence may cause investors to flee nearby markets as well.
contagion Usage Examples

Preposition: of

  • aggression: WHEELER, L. & SMITH, S. ( 1967 ) Censure of the model in the contagion of aggression.
  • heresy: The Inquisition was firm about protecting the young and ignorant from the contagion of heresy.

Converse of object

  • prevent: It is imperative that hydration is maintained in affected animals and that precautions are taken to prevent contagion of adjacent stock.
  • spread: The barons are now spreading the contagion to the developing world.
  • avoid: To avoid contagion, it is legitimate for the EU to submit national budgets to a binding discipline.
  • escape: Nor could the heroism and the folly be kept apart, for there were few who could quite escape the contagion of the times.
  • limit: And international response to financial crises is an imperative to limit the contagion of panic and financial losses.

Adjective modifier

  • financial: The high degree of economic interdependence in the region spread the financial contagion from one country to another.
  • social: It is not offered as a general theory of cultural evolution, nor a general theory of social contagion.
  • emotional: However, little research has been done on relatives of individuals with emotional disorders, despite developments in the area of emotional contagion.
  • moral: Instead, I let others suffer the full moral contagion, and make sure the only dirt on my hands is the physical sort.
  • behavioral: WHEELER, L. ( 1966 ) Toward a theory of behavioral contagion.
  • deadly: And that would not be so bad, only for the deadly contagion.

Modifies a noun

  • problem: Accordingly, we suggest that the results can be applied to various SWN models used to simulate contagion problems.
  • effect: These rippling or contagion effects have provoked increasing interest since the 1997 Asian financial crises.
  • spread: However, as the Asian contagion spread and economic contraction followed, oil prices fell to $ 9 per barrel in 1998.
  • theory: Free cell formation, heterogenesis, and the chemical contagion theory all seemed to have disappeared.
  • probability: The factors are then combined by multiplication, and the result raised to the power of 1/3 to give the final contagion probability.
  • research: Social contagion research has produced an eclectic, largely confused and jumbled body of evidence that lacks any comprehensive organizing principle or conceptual framework.

Noun used with modifier

  • thought: False beliefs can spread as thought contagions, but so too can true beliefs.
contagion Quotes

   To be, or not to be; that is the bare bodkin That makes calamity of so long life; For who would fardels bear, till Birnam Wood do come to Dunsinane, But that the fear of something after death Murders the innocent sleep, Great nature's second course, And makes us rather sling the arrows of outrageous fortune Than fly to others that we know not of. There's the respect must give us pause: Wake Duncan with thy knocking! I would thou couldst; For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,

—Twain, Mark pseudonym of  Samuel Langhorne Clemens

The sad presaging raven, that tolls The sick man's passport in her hollow beak, And in the shadow of the silent night Doth shake contagion from her sable wings.

—Marlowe, Christopher

Sure there's contagion in the tears of friends.

—Dryden,John

   He has out-soared the shadow of our night; Envyand calumnyand hate and pain, And that unrest which men miscall delight, Can touch him not and torture not again; From the contagion of the world's slow stain He is secure, and now can never mourn A heart grown cold, a head grown grey in vain.

—Shelley, Percy Bysshe

That it is at least as difficult to staya moral infection as a physical one; that such a disease will spread with the malignityand rapidity of the Plague; that the contagion, when it has once made head, will spare no pursuit or condition, but will lay hold on people in the soundest health, and become developed inthe most unlikely constitutions; is a fact as firmlyestablished by experience as that we human creatures breathe an atmosphere.

—Dickens, CharlesJohn Huffam

Ninety-ninepercent of the people inthe world are fools, and the rest of us are in great danger of contagion.

—Wilder,Thornton Niven

Theyare sped; And when they list, their lean and flashy songs 578 Grate on their scrannel Pipes of wretched straw, The hungry sheep look up, and are not fed, But swollen with wind, and the rank mist they draw, Rot inwardly, and foul contagion spread, Besides what the grim wolf with privy paw Daily devours apace, and nothing said, But that two-handed engine at the door, Stands ready to smite once, and smite no more.

—Milton,John