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偏执 (piān zhí) — (stative verb) stubborn and biased, bigoted; (stative verb, psychology) paranoid

Definition

Adjective describing a person or personality that is stubbornly fixated on one's own ideas and refuses to consider others — a stronger, more clinical word than 固执 ('stubborn'), often used in psychology to describe paranoid tendencies.

adjective
(stative verb) stubborn and biasedbigoted(stative verb, psychology) paranoid

Examples

  • 偏执，。
    Tā duì bié rén de yì jiàn fēi cháng piān zhí, hěn nán shuō fú.
    He is very stubborn about others' opinions and hard to convince.
  • 偏执。
    Zhè zhǒng piān zhí de xìng gé ràng tā shī qù le hěn duō péng you.
    This paranoid personality made him lose many friends.
  • 偏执。
    Tā yīn wèi piān zhí de xiǎng fǎ ér jù jué le suǒ yǒu de bāng zhù.
    She rejected all help because of her bigoted ideas.

Origin

Compound word
构词法gòucífǎ
联合liánhéCoordinate

Two parts of equal weight, alike or opposite in meaning, standing side by side.

偏piānbiased
执zhístubborn

偏 gives bias, 执 gives stubbornness, together meaning stubbornly biased.

Characters in this word

Most characters — around four in five — are built this way: one part hints at the meaning, the other at the pronunciation.

Meaning part形符xíngfú
亻Written in full as人rén
Sound part声符shēngfú
扁
扁biǎn偏piān
Same sound today

偏 combines 亻 (人, a person) with 扁, which gives the sound.

Open 偏 →

Two or more meaningful parts placed together so that their meanings combine into a new one.

This origin belongs to the traditional form 執; 执 is its simplified writing.

  • 㚔㚔㚔criminal / handcuffs
  • 丮丮jǐhand

The traditional form 執 shows 㚔, a handcuffed criminal, with 丮, a hand, giving the idea of arrest. The simplified 执 is a later shorthand, so its current parts are not the original pieces.

Open 执 →
Appears in
Mental HealthPersonality & Traits

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