DEFICIT

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does deficit mean? 

• DEFICIT (noun)
  The noun DEFICIT has 4 senses:

1. the property of being an amount by which something is less than expected or required

2. a deficiency or failure in neurological or mental functioning

3. (sports) the score by which a team or individual is losing

4. an excess of liabilities over assets (usually over a certain period)

  Familiarity information: DEFICIT used as a noun is uncommon.

 Dictionary entry details 

• DEFICIT (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

The property of being an amount by which something is less than expected or required

Classified under:

Nouns denoting attributes of people and objects

Synonyms:

deficit; shortage; shortfall

Context example:

new blood vessels bud out from the already dilated vascular bed to make up the nutritional deficit

Hypernyms ("deficit" is a kind of...):

deficiency; inadequacy; insufficiency (lack of an adequate quantity or number)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "deficit"):

oxygen deficit (temporary oxygen shortage in cells resulting from strenuous exercise)

Sense 2

Meaning:

A deficiency or failure in neurological or mental functioning

Classified under:

Nouns denoting stable states of affairs

Context example:

they have serious linguistic deficits

Hypernyms ("deficit" is a kind of...):

deficiency; lack; want (the state of needing something that is absent or unavailable)

Sense 3

Meaning:

(sports) the score by which a team or individual is losing

Classified under:

Nouns denoting quantities and units of measure

Hypernyms ("deficit" is a kind of...):

score (a number that expresses the accomplishment of a team or an individual in a game or contest)

Domain category:

athletics; sport (an active diversion requiring physical exertion and competition)

Antonym:

lead ((sports) the score by which a team or individual is winning)

Sense 4

Meaning:

An excess of liabilities over assets (usually over a certain period)

Classified under:

Nouns denoting possession and transfer of possession

Context example:

last year there was a serious budgetary deficit

Hypernyms ("deficit" is a kind of...):

liabilities (anything that is owed to someone else)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "deficit"):

budget deficit (an excess of expenditures over revenues)

trade deficit (an excess of imports over exports)

 Context examples 

The money which I had reckoned upon never came to hand, and a premature examination of accounts exposed my deficit.

(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

It also allows comparison between subjects with different kinds of neurologic deficits.

(Modified Rankin Scale Questionnaire, NCI Thesaurus)

A new study identified a set of 10 compounds in the blood that might be used to identify older adults at risk for developing memory deficits or Alzheimer's disease.

(Study Points to Possible Blood Test For Memory Decline, Alzheimer’s, NIH)

A group of disorders caused by a prenatal exposure to maternal consumption of alcohol leading to a range of behavioral, cognitive and neurological deficits in the offspring.

(Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder, NCI Thesaurus)

It is characterized by skeletal and central nervous system deficits.

(Mucopolysaccharidosis Type IVA, NCI Thesaurus)

Mild hyponatremia was once thought to be asymptomatic, but recent studies suggest that it may be associated with higher risks of attention deficits, gait disturbances, falls, cardiovascular events, and even premature death.

(Blood Sodium Levels May Affect Cognition in Older Adults, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

The deficits range from almost complete muteness to a reduction in the fluency and rate of speech.

(Broca's Aphasia, NLM, Medical Subject Headings)

It measures both recall and recognition of words over a number of trials and has been found to be sensitive to memory deficits resulting from a variety of neurological conditions.

(California Verbal Learning Test, Children's Version, NCI Thesaurus)

Home health nursing refers to the practice of nursing applied to a client with a health deficit in the client's place of residence or appropriate community site.

(Home Health Nurse Specialist, NCI Thesaurus)

Clinical manifestations include fever, headache, alterations of mentation, focal neurologic deficits, and COMA. (From Clin Microbiol Rev 1994 Jan;7(1):89-116; Walton, Brain's Diseases of the Nervous System, 10th ed, p321)

(Epidemic Encephalitis, NLM, Medical Subject Headings)