irritating

irritate Definition

ir·ri·tate (ir′i tāt′)

transitive verb irritated -·tat′ed, irritating -·tat′·ing

to excite to anger; provoke; annoy; exasperate
to cause (an organ or part of the body) to be inflamed or sore
Physiol. to excite (an organ, muscle, etc.) to a characteristic action or function by a stimulus

Etymology: < L irritatus, pp. of irritare, to excite, stimulate, irritate < ir-, in- + IE base *erei-, to excite, agitate > roam

Related Forms:

irritating Synonyms

modif.

irritating Usage Examples

Object

cough: A child with mild asthma may have an irritating cough each night, but is often fine during the day.

Preposition: at

Noun phrase with adjective complement

such: These " granules " are the irritating substances such as histamine and were released from the mast cell.

Modifying Another Word

mildly: The only mildly irritating aspect of the evening was the apparent lack of a smoking policy.
intensely: He also has an intensely irritating habit of keeping facts away from the reader.
moderately: Olibanum gum applied to intact or abraded rabbit skin for 24 hours under occlusion was found to be moderately irritating.
immensely: Also immensely irritating is the movie's choppy editing style.

Preposition: after

while: The stereo sound is average but the dialog comes through fine although the laugh track does get irritating after a while.

Used with why or when

when: What might be interesting stuff becomes distracting and in some cases irritating when it interrupts another story.

Infinitive complement

read: Mysteries are all unraveled eventually, but it is irritating to read 'After the accident.
find: Thatâs why it was so irritating to find the front-of-house staff charming.

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