cabin fever
English
Etymology
In the current sense coined or popularized in a 1918 novel of the same name.[1]
Noun
cabin fever (uncountable)
- (psychology) A condition of restlessness and irritability caused by being in a confined space.
- Some residents of Alaska suffer from cabin fever when they remain indoors throughout the long, snowy winters.
- 2004, Lois Olson, Meeting Him in the Wilderness: A True Story of Adventure and Faith, iUniverse, →ISBN, page 102:
- The novelty of a wilderness winter wore off. I began to suffer from cabin fever. I was so anxious to see someone that whenever I heard a car or truck motor, I jumped up on a chair to look out.
- (obsolete) Typhus.
- 1820, The Gentleman's Magazine, volume 128, page 139:
- The certain consequence is the low typhus or cabin fever, which at all times, and at this present moment, exists in Ireland to a degree, that in any other country would create a serious alarm.
- 1820, The Gentleman's Magazine, volume 128, page 139:
Derived terms
- cabin-fevered
Translations
psychological condition
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See also
- claustrophobia
- stir-crazy
References
- B. M. Bower (1918), chapter 1, in Cabin Fever: “There is a certain malady of the mind induced by too much of one thing. Just as the body fed too long upon meat becomes a prey to that horrid disease called scurvy, so the mind fed too long upon monotony succumbs to the insidious mental ailment which the West calls “cabin fever.””
Further reading
cabin fever on Wikipedia.Wikipedia