catastrophize

• catastrophise (non-Oxford British English)

From catastrophe +‎ -ize.

• IPA^(key): /kəˈtæstɹəfaɪz/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• Hyphenation: ca‧tas‧tro‧phize

catastrophize (third-person singular simple present catastrophizes, present participle catastrophizing, simple past and past participle catastrophized)

1. (transitive, intransitive) To regard a bad situation as if it were disastrous or catastrophic.
2. (transitive, intransitive, psychology) To expose a behavior pattern of seeking the worst interpretation and magnifying the disagreeable outcomes (of).

   Synonym: awfulize

   • 1947, Tavistock Institute of Human Relations, University of Michigan Research Center for Group Dynamics, Human Relations:

     Particularly likely to overreact are those who tend to catastrophize (Ellis, 1962) and those who have Type A personalities (Friedman & Rosenman, 1974).

   • 2001, David H. Barlow, Clinical Handbook of Psychological Disorders:

     Another way to catastrophize is to jump to an extreme conclusion from an unimportant or irrelevant event.

   • 2017, LeeAnne B. Sherwin, Emily Leary, Wendy A. Henderson, “The association of catastrophizing with quality-of-life outcomes in patients with irritable bowel syndrome”, in Quality of Life Research‎^[1], volume 26, number 8, →DOI:

     [I]ndividuals who catastrophized reported worse health-related quality of life, higher psychological distress, and perceived more somatic symptoms, worse consequences, and more severe emotional impact as compared to those participants who did not catastrophize.

   • 2025 November 5, Sophie Gilbert, “No, Women Aren’t the Problem”, in The Atlantic‎^[2]:

     “The Great Feminization” catastrophizes wildly about the future, presumably because what’s happening in the present utterly undermines its central thesis.

3. (obsolete) To end a comedy.