Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2012.
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| a white, crystalline, water-insoluble, powerful high explosive, C3H6N6O6, used chiefly in bombs and shells. |
| the estimation of something as valueless (encountered mainly as an example of one of the longest words in the English language). |
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kleptomania
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kleptomania klep·to·ma·ni·a (klěp'tə-mā'nē-ə, -mān'yə)
n.
An obsessive impulse to steal regardless of economic need, usually arising from an unconscious symbolic value associated with the stolen item.
klep'to·ma'ni·ac' (-nē-āk') adj.
Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company.
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A compulsion to steal, usually without either economic need or personal desire.
Copyright © 2005 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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kleptomania
recurrent compulsion to steal without regard to the value or use of the objects stolen. Although widely known and sometimes used as an attempted legal defense by arrested thieves, genuine kleptomania is a fairly rare mental disorder. A kleptomaniac may hide, give away, or secretly return the stolen items, but he seldom uses them or attempts to profit by their resale. The kleptomaniac usually has the economic means to purchase what he steals and obtains gratification from the theft itself rather than from its object.
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