volition

Etymology

It is borrowed from French volition,^[2][3][4][5] recorded in French from the 16th century,^[2][3] from Medieval Latin volitiō (“will, volition”),^[2][3][4][5] a noun of action from the stem of Latin volō (“to wish, to will”),^[2][3][6] which goes back to Proto-Indo-European *wel- (“to wish, will”).^[3][5] Ayto glosses the root "be pleasing" and adds that it also produced will, volunteer and voluptuous.^[6] Skeat thought the Medieval Latin noun was probably a term of the schools,^[7] and some dictionaries take the English word directly from it, without the French step.^[8][9][10]

Earliest recorded meaning

An act of willing or resolving, a decision made after deliberation, with a plural: 1615, in Thomas Jackson's Iustifying Faith.^[2][11][4] Etymonline dates the word to the 1610s.^[3]

Semantic evolution

The first sense was a single act, a volition; from 1654 it was also used of the will of God;^[2] this countable use is now rare.^[12] The abstract sense, the exercise of the will, is recorded from 1660,^[2] and Barnhart dates the sense "power of willing" to the same year,^[4] though the OED has "the power or faculty of willing" only from 1738 and "will-power" from 1844, in Disraeli's Coningsby.^[2] Johnson (1755) covered both sides: "the act of willing; the power of choice exerted".^[13] Today the word is met above all in the phrase of one's own volition,^[14][12] and philosophers use it for an act of will as distinct from the bodily movement it aims at.^[14]

Timeline

• 1615 – an act of willing; a decision or resolution.^[2][11][4]
• 1654 – with reference to the will of God.^[2]
• 1660 – the action of consciously willing; exercise of the will.^[2]
• 1738 – the power or faculty of willing.^[2]
• 1844 – will-power.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. The act of willing or choosing; the exercise of the will: He resigned of his own volition.^[14][11][2]
2. The power or faculty of choosing and deciding; willpower.^[14][11][2]
3. A choice or decision reached by such an act.^[14][11][12]
4. (philosophy) An act of will as distinguished from the physical movement it intends to bring about.^[14]

Word family

• volitional
• volitionally
• nonvolition

Related words

• volunteer
• will
• voluntary
• voluptuous
• benevolent
• nolition

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
5. ^ a b c The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
6. ^ a b Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
7. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
9. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
10. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
11. ^ a b c d e Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
12. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
13. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
14. ^ a b c d e f Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins