aetiology

• ætiology (archaic)
• aitiology
• etiology (US, Canada)

Learned borrowing from Latin aetiologia, from Ancient Greek αἰτιολογία (aitiología), from αἰτία (aitía, “cause”). By surface analysis, aetio- +‎ -logy; Doublet of aetiologia.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /iː.tɪˈɒ.lə.dʒi/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /i.tiˈɑ.lə.d͡ʒi/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɒlədʒi

aetiology (countable and uncountable, plural aetiologies)

1. The establishment of a cause, origin, or reason for something.
   • 1999, Sigmund Freud, translated by Joyce Crick, The Interpretation of Dreams, I.c:

     I do not know where the idea first arose of enlisting internal (subjective) excitations of the sensory organs as well as external sensory stimuli; but it is in fact done in all the more recent accounts of the aetiology of dreams [translating Traumätiologie].

2. The study of causes or causation.
3. (medicine, uncountable) The study or investigation of the causes of disease; a scientific explanation for the origin of a disease.
4. (medicine, countable) A cause of disease or of any particular case of a disease (but see pathology § Usage notes).

• Not to be confused with etymology.
• See also pathology § Usage notes.