1. A neurotic condition characterized by obsessive thoughts, compulsive behaviors, phobias, and feelings of inadequacy or doubt.
Usage: dated or technical; primarily used in early 20th-century psychology and psychiatry; largely superseded by modern diagnostic terms such as obsessive-compulsive disorder and anxiety disorders

Examples

• The psychiatrist diagnosed the patient with psychasthenia after observing persistent obsessive thoughts and ritualistic behaviors.
• In early psychological literature, psychasthenia was described as a weakness of the mind characterized by doubt and indecision.
• The term psychasthenia has largely fallen out of clinical use in favor of more specific modern diagnostic categories.
• Patients with psychasthenia often experienced intrusive thoughts that interfered with daily functioning.
• The concept of psychasthenia was influential in late 19th and early 20th-century psychiatry before being refined into contemporary diagnostic frameworks.