impact
English
Etymology
Attested since the 17th century, from Latin impāctus, perfect passive participle of impingō (“dash against, impinge”), from in- + pangō (“fasten, drive in”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *peh₂ǵ-.
Pronunciation
- (noun): enPR: imʹpăkt, IPA(key): /ˈɪmpækt/
Audio (UK) (file) - (verb): enPR: im-păktʹ, IPA(key): /ɪmˈpækt/
Audio (UK) (file) - Rhymes: -ækt
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.
- (figuratively, 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.
- 2016, Jayson Lusk, Unnaturally Delicious, →ISBN, page 111:
- One way to reduce the environmental impact of meat eating is to make livestock more productive.
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)
- impact aid
- impact area
- impact crater
- impactful
- impactite
- impactive
- impact statement
Related terms
- impinge
Translations
a collision
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the force or energy of a collision of two objects
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a forced impinging
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a significant or strong influence
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- The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
Translations to be checked
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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, figuratively, 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
- impaction
- impactor
Translations
to collide or strike
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to compress
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to influence
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French
Etymology
From Latin, see above.
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /ɛ̃.pakt/
Audio (file)
Noun
impact m (plural impacts)
- (literally or figuratively) impact
Further reading
- “impact”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.
Romanian
Etymology
From French impact, from Latin impactus.
Noun
impact n (plural impacturi)
- impact
Declension
Declension of impact
| singular | plural | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| indefinite articulation | definite articulation | indefinite articulation | definite articulation | |
| nominative/accusative | (un) impact | impactul | (niște) impacturi | impacturile |
| genitive/dative | (unui) impact | impactului | (unor) impacturi | impacturilor |
| vocative | impactule | impacturilor | ||