perfunctoriness

English

Etymology

From perfunctory +‎ -ness.

Noun

perfunctoriness (uncountable)

1. The characteristic or state of being perfunctory.

   Synonyms: automaticity, mechanicality, mechanicalness

   • 1894, Thomas Hardy, “On the Western Circuit”, in Life’s Little Ironies […], London: Osgood, McIlvaine and Co., […], →OCLC, section VI, page 121:

     When at dusk she reached the Melchester station her husband was there to meet her, but in his perfunctoriness and her preoccupation they did not see each other, and she went out of the station alone.

   • 1901, Edith Wharton, “The Recovery”, in Crucial Instances:

     Claudia accomplished some shopping in the spirit of perfunctoriness that robs even new bonnets of their bloom.

   • 2006 November 30, David Cohen, “A Bit Nasty to Women, But Respectful to Dishware”, in New York Sun, retrieved 28 June 2011:

     His hard-core images are delivered with a ho-hum perfunctoriness that often enervates his surfaces. . . . [H]is orgies are inert.

Further reading

• “perfunctoriness”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.