Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Inhibiting or tending to inhibit; holding back; curbing, restraining, or repressing; checking or stopping.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective Of or pertaining to, or producing, inhibition; consisting in inhibition; tending or serving to inhibit.
  • adjective (Physiol.) those nerves which modify, inhibit, or suppress a motor or secretory act already in progress.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective that inhibits
  • adjective of, or relating to an inhibitor

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective restrictive of action

Etymologies

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Examples

  • Those that make you happy, relaxed, and peaceful are called inhibitory neurotransmitters.

    The UltraMind Solution M.D. Mark Hyman 2009

  • Drugs against anxiety act for instance on certain inhibitory ionic channels in the brain.

    Physiology or Medicine 1991 - Press Release 1991

  • Again, the normal influence of the vaso-motor center may be suspended for a time by what is known as the inhibitory or restraining effect.

    A Practical Physiology Albert F. Blaisdell

  • Once the appellate judge has ascertained that the appellant has legitimately appealed, and that the appeal is not one of those that have only a devolutive effect, he has the right to send to the judge appellee letters called inhibitory, forbidding him to take further action in the case.

    The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume 1: Aachen-Assize 1840-1916 1913

  • This has sometimes been attributed to what has been called the inhibitory effect of Christianity on worldly interests.

    Old-Time Makers of Medicine The Story of The Students And Teachers of the Sciences Related to Medicine During the Middle Ages James Joseph Walsh 1903

  • Some kind of inhibitory block, repression of unpleasant events.

    The Striker Portfolio Hall, Adam 1968

  • An "inhibitory" afferent nerve emerged simply as an afferent nerve whose impulses at certain central loci cause, directly or indirectly, inhibition, while at other central loci the same nerve, probably even the same nerve fibre can produce excitation.

    Sir Charles Sherrington - Nobel Lecture 1965

  • Early-activated genes in our system also include negative intracellular regulators of TGFβ signalling, such as inhibitory Smad7

    PLoS ONE Alerts: New Articles 2009

  • Keep in mind the drugs don't cause your body to produce more 'inhibitory' brain messengers.

    CBN.com 2009

  • The 'inhibitory' brain messengers are designed to calm and relax the body.

    CBN.com 2009

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