schizophrenic

Etymology

From schizophrenia + -ic.

adj

  1. Of or relating to schizophrenia.
  2. (of a person) Afflicted with schizophrenia; having difficulty with perception of reality.
  3. (informal, deprecated) Exhibiting more than one personality; having a wildly changeable personality.
    The average person is afraid that such a common experience means that he is "splitting off" and becoming schizophrenic. 1981, William Irwin Thompson, The Time Falling Bodies Take to Light: Mythology, Sexuality and the Origins of Culture, London: Rider/Hutchinson & Co., page 220
  4. (informal) Having qualities that strongly jar or are at odds.
    Society currently displays a schizophrenic attitude to drug abuse. We seem to accept alcohol intake and smoking during pregnancy even though we know that these drugs can be addictive, and that regular use can affect the baby. 2011, Edmund Hey, Neonatal Formulary: Drug Use in Pregnancy and the First Year of Life
    The neoclassical synthesis was a schizophrenic approach to economics – a way of subscribing to both Keynesian and classical analysis. 2012, Thomas Boylan, Paschal O'Gorman, Hahn and Economic Methodology

noun

  1. A person suffering from schizophrenia.

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