Psychotherapy

How to spell psychotherapy

13 letters · 5 syllables

How to pronounce psychotherapy

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does psychotherapy mean?

1. nounThe treatment of mental or emotional difficulties by talking with a trained professional rather than by medication.

Psychotherapy in a sentence

• After months of anxiety she began weekly psychotherapy to learn better coping strategies.

• The clinic offers both medication and psychotherapy for patients with anxiety.

Where does psychotherapy come from?

Language of origin: Greek

This word is built entirely from Greek roots and was assembled fairly recently, in the late nineteenth century, as the formal study of treating the mind took shape. The first element comes from psukhe, which originally meant 'breath' and then 'soul' or 'mind'; the ancient Greeks imagined the soul as the breath that left the body at death. The second element comes from therapeia, meaning 'healing', 'attendance', or 'service', from the verb therapeuein, 'to attend to' or 'to treat medically'. Joined together, the parts literally mean 'healing of the mind', a sense that matches the modern practice exactly. The spelling trap lives at the front: the Greek combination 'ps' kept its written p even though English speakers say only the s sound, which is the same silent p that haunts 'psychology' and 'pneumonia', and the 'th' in the middle reflects the Greek theta.

How the word is built

• psycho- (from Greek psukhe: mind, soul)
• therap- (from Greek therapeia: healing, treatment)
• -y (noun suffix)