perfectionism

/pə'fekʃənizm/

Thân thiện

A student carefully erases a small smudge on her drawing to achieve perfectionism.

Definition

1. Noun:
   • A personal standard or philosophy that demands perfection and rejects anything less: Perfectionism is the belief or tendency to accept only flawless results, often leading to setting extremely high, sometimes unattainable, goals for oneself or others.

Usage and Examples

• Noun:
  • Her perfectionism makes her spend hours editing a single paragraph.
  • The director's perfectionism was evident in every detail of the film.
  • While striving for excellence is good, excessive perfectionism can lead to stress and burnout.

Advanced Usage

• Clinical/psychological context: In psychology, perfectionism is often discussed as a personality trait with both adaptive (striving for excellence) and maladaptive (self-critical, fear of failure) dimensions.
  • The study examined the link between maladaptive perfectionism and anxiety disorders.
• As a driving force in work or art: Used to describe the relentless pursuit of an ideal as a motivating principle.
  • The legendary craftsmanship of the violin is a testament to the luthier's perfectionism.

Variants and Related Words

• Perfectionist (noun): A person who has or is influenced by perfectionism.
  • She is such a perfectionist that she re-wrote the report five times.
• Perfectionistic (adjective): Characterized by perfectionism.
  • His perfectionistic tendencies were both an asset and a hindrance.

Synonyms

• Fastidiousness: Being very attentive to and concerned about accuracy and detail.
• Meticulousness: Showing great attention to detail; very careful and precise.
• Exactitude: The quality of being very accurate and careful.

Antonyms

• Negligence: Failure to take proper care over something.
• Sloppiness: Lack of care or effort; messiness.
• Contentment: A state of happiness and satisfaction, often implying acceptance of "good enough."

Related Idioms and Phrases

• A perfectionist's nightmare: A situation or task that is inherently messy or impossible to perfect, causing distress to a perfectionist.
  • Group projects with unclear guidelines are a perfectionist's nightmare.
• Pursuit of perfection: The continuous effort to achieve a flawless state.
  • His life was a relentless pursuit of perfection in his art.

Học thuật

Noun

1. a disposition to feel that anything less than perfect is unacceptable
   • his perfectionism seemed excessive to his students