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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

disturb.

to confuse a quiet, constant state or a calm, continuous flow, in particular: thoughts, actions or liquids.

7 characters2 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

verb/dɪˈstɜːb/Australia, Received-Pronunciation/dɪˈstɝb/Canada, General-American/ɖɪsˈʈɜ(r)b/South-Asia/ˈɖɪsʈə(r)b/South-Asia
  1. to confuse a quiet, constant state or a calm, continuous flow, in particular: thoughts, actions or liquids.

    transitive
    The noisy ventilation disturbed me during the exam.
    The performance was disturbed twice by a ringing mobile phone.
  2. to divert, redirect, or alter by disturbing.

    transitive
    A mudslide disturbed the course of the river.
    The trauma disturbed his mind.
  3. to have a negative emotional impact; to cause emotional distress or confusion.

    intransitive
Where this word comes from

From Middle English destourben, from Anglo-Norman distourber and Old French destorber, from Latin disturbare, intensifying for turbare (“to throw into disorder”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *(s)twerH-, *(s)turH- (“to rotate, swirl, twirl, move around”).

noun/dɪˈstɜːb/Australia, Received-Pronunciation/dɪˈstɝb/Canada, General-American/ɖɪsˈʈɜ(r)b/South-Asia/ˈɖɪsʈə(r)b/South-Asia
  1. disturbance

    obsolete
Where this word comes from

From Middle English destourben, from Anglo-Norman distourber and Old French destorber, from Latin disturbare, intensifying for turbare (“to throw into disorder”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *(s)twerH-, *(s)turH- (“to rotate, swirl, twirl, move around”).

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.