"pressured" - Word of the Day from the OED

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pressured, adj.

DRAFT REVISION Mar. 2007

Brit. /prd/, U.S. /prrd/  [Partly < PRESSURE n.¹ + -ED suffix², and partly < PRESSURE v. (which is first attested later in the physical sense) + -ED suffix¹. Compare PRESSURIZED adj.] 

    1. Containing gas or liquid under pressure; (of a fluid) increased in pressure; pressurized.

1920 Chicago Tribune 29 Mar. 5/5 When the tornado passes over the roof of a house the higher pressured air inside explodes. 1928 Los Angeles Times 13 Oct. II. 2/8 The balls will be injected into the pressured casing. 1944 N.Y. Times 26 June 23/8 Pressured cabins will permit comfortable flying above bad weather at about four miles altitude. 2003 Machine Design 8 May 80/1 Bearings using porous surface compensation..issue pressured air from an entire bearing face through millions of micron-sized pores.

    2. a. Of a person: under (non-physical) pressure; feeling emotional or psychological stress.

1951 Los Angeles Times 29 May II. 5/6 Meantime, though, the reader will have met..the men who are so pressured that they are dishonest in spite of themselves. 1976 Times 8 July 2/5 He said the personalities of Joseph Markham and later Clive Mildoon began as fantasies, providing relief for the pressured and overburdened public figure of Mr John Stonehouse. 1995 C. L. GREEN John Betjeman Lett. (1996) X. 516 Gradually JB stopped feeling quite so pressured.

    b. Of work, affairs, etc.: stressful; urgent, pressing.

1954 Mansfield (Ohio) News-Jrnl. 15 Sept. 38 (advt.) Deeply penetrating motorized massage that has proven to be dramatically effective.., aiding in soothing the tension and the muscle aches of your pressured work day. 1971 C. BONINGTON Annapurna South Face iii. 32, I..was near to exhaustion from weeks of pressured work and worry. 1999 N.Y. Times 15 Feb. B5/2 Police work is highly pressured work. It's very intense.

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