hysteresis
|his-te-re-sis|
/ˌhɪstəˈriːsɪs/
lag that depends on history
Etymology
'hysteresis' originates from Greek, specifically the word 'hysterēsis', where 'hysteros' meant 'later' or 'to be behind'.
'hysteresis' entered scientific English in the late 19th century (used in physics and engineering contexts), borrowed from Neo-Latin/Greek 'hysteresis' and popularized in technical literature describing lag and retention effects.
Initially it meant 'a falling short, delay' in Greek, but over time it evolved into the modern technical sense of 'a system's dependence on its past states (lagging response)'.
Meanings by Part of Speech
Noun 1
a phenomenon in which the state of a system depends on its history; the system's response lags behind changes in influencing factors so that the current state depends on past inputs as well as present ones.
In many physical and biological systems, hysteresis causes the output to follow a different path when input is increasing than when it is decreasing.
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Noun 2
in magnetism and ferromagnetic materials, the dependence of magnetization on the history of applied magnetic field, typically represented by a hysteresis loop on a B-H curve.
The hysteresis of this iron sample is visible as a loop when plotting magnetic flux density against applied field strength.
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Noun 3
in economics and social sciences, the persistence of effects (for example, unemployment) after the initial cause has been removed — i.e., past shocks have lasting effects on the level of a variable.
Economists discuss hysteresis to explain why unemployment may remain high even after economic growth resumes.
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Last updated: 2025/11/19 10:33