impact
impact - English
Pronunciation
- (noun): enPR: imʹpăkt, IPA: /ˈɪmpækt/
- (verb): enPR: im-păktʹ, IPA: /ɪmˈpækt/
Noun
impact (countable and uncountable, plural impacts)
- The striking of one body against another; collision.
- The force or energy of a collision of two objects.
- The hatchet cut the wood on impact.
- (chiefly medicine) A forced impinging.
- His spine had an impingement; L4 and L5 made impact, which caused numbness in his leg.
- (figurative, proscribed) A significant or strong influence or effect.
- His friend's opinion had an impact on his decision.
- Our choice of concrete will have a tremendous impact on the building's mechanical performance.
Usage notes
- Adjectives often applied to "impact": social, political, physical, positive, negative, good, bad, beneficial, harmful, significant, great, important, strong, big, small, real, huge, likely, actual, potential, devastating, disastrous, true, primary.
- The adposition generally used with "impact" is "on" (such as in last example in section above)
- There are some who find the figurative noun sense problematic, with a low threshold for labeling such use as overuse (cliché). In defensive editing, the solution is to replace the figurative noun sense with effect and the verb sense with affect, which nearly always produces an acceptable result. (Rarely, a phrase such as "the impact of late effects" is better stetted to avoid "the effect of [...] effects".)
Derived terms
Terms derived from impact (noun)
- adverse impact
- Charpy impact test
- high-impact
- impact aid
- impact area
- impact crater
- impact crater
- impact driver
- impact energy
- impact factor
- impactful
- impactite
- impactive
- impact printer
- impact resistance
- impact sourcing
- impact statement
- impact winter
- low-impact
- second impact syndrome
- victim impact statement
Related terms
Translations
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Verb
impact (third-person singular simple present impacts, present participle impacting, simple past and past participle impacted)
- (transitive) To collide or strike, the act of impinging.
- When the hammer impacts the nail, it bends.
- (transitive) To compress; to compact; to press into something or pack together.
- The footprints of birds do not impact the soil in the way those of dinosaurs do.
- (transitive, figurative, proscribed) To significantly or strongly influence or affect; to have an impact on.
- I can make the changes, but it will impact the schedule.
- (transitive, rare) To stamp or impress onto something.
- Ideas impacted on the mind.
Usage notes
Some authorities object to the verb sense of impact meaning "to significantly or strongly influence or affect; to have an impact on". Although most verbification instances in English draw no prescriptive attention, a few do, including this one. To avoid controversy, one can replace the verb sense with affect, which nearly always produces an acceptable result. See also the usage note for the noun sense.
Derived terms
Translations
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impact - French
Pronunciation
- IPA: /ɛ̃.pakt/
Noun
impact m (plural impacts)
- (literally or figuratively) impact
impact - Romanian
Noun
impact n (plural impacturi)