impaired, ppl. a.
(ɪmˈpɛəd)
[f. impair v. + -ed1.]
1. Rendered worse; injured in amount, quality, or value; deteriorated, weakened, damaged.
| 1611 Speed Hist. Gt. Brit. ix. viii. (1632) 563 He repaired with large diet his impayred lims and sinewes. 1719 Bolingbroke in Swift's Lett. (1766) II. 4 Those fancy'd ills, so dreadful to the great, A lost election, or impair'd estate. 1845 Stocqueler Handbk. Brit. India (1854) 170 Hamilton..was necessitated by an impaired constitution to return to England. |
2. Of a driver or his driving: adversely affected by the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Canad.
| 1951 Act (Canada) 15 Geo. VI c. 47 §14 Driving while ability to drive is impaired. 1957 (title) Report on impaired driving tests (Crime Detection Laboratories of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police). 1967 W. S. Avis et al. Dict. Canad. Eng., Senior Dict. 573/2 Impaired driver, one whose driving ability has been impaired by alcohol or narcotics. 1970 Toronto Daily Star 24 Sept. 37/1 Ange Gardien..was charged with impaired driving. 1972 Evening Telegram (St. John's, Newfoundland) 24 June 1/1 A police spokesman said the car received only slight damage. The driver was arrested and charged with impaired driving. 1973 Kingston (Ontario) Whig-Standard 18 Apr. 15/2 Another motorist..was fined $175 and prohibited from driving for four months on a charge of impaired driving. 1973 Daily Colonist (Victoria, B.C.) 26 Apr. 41/3 Georg Edward Haines..was fined $350 following his plea of guilty to a charge of being impaired early Wednesday in Victoria while in care or control of a vehicle. Ibid., Edward Weiland..pleaded guilty to a two-count Victoria charge of impaired driving and refusing to take a breath-analysis test. 1974 Kingston (Ontario) Whig-Standard 16 Jan. 5/4 A snowmobile operator was one of five persons assessed penalties ranging from $175 to $200 each in county court Tuesday on impaired driving charges. |
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▸ orig. U.S. As the second element in compounds, forming adjectives or (with the and pl. concord) mass nouns. Cf. challenged adj. at challenge v. Additions. a. Disabled (to some extent) in the capacity specified, as speech-impaired, visually-impaired, etc.
Recorded earliest in hearing-impaired adj. and n. at hearing n. Additions
| 1946 Charleroi (Pa.) Mail 24 May 8/2 Favorable results are obtained if the special considerations that are shown the hearing impaired child are done without calling attention to the defect. 1947 Council Bluffs (Iowa) Nonpareil 12 Oct. 24/6 It [sc. the special education division] checks pupils who are visually impaired or hard of hearing. 1964 Public Opinion Q. 28 662 Among the visually impaired..persons with equal loss of vision often differ greatly in their willingness to accept the definition of blindness. 1987 Amer. Jrnl. Sociol. 93 506 Since World War II, public school special education programs—classes for the mentally retarded, learning disabled, speech impaired, gifted, and physically handicapped—have been a growth industry. 1997 Cincinnati Enquirer 23 Nov. b3/7 Subscribers..include 24 hospitals and nursing homes and about 2,000 individuals who are sight-impaired. 2003 Holiday Which? Spring 89/1 She was ‘totally floored by my disability’, commented our vision-impaired and wheelchair-using inspector. |
b. humorous. Lacking or deficient in the attribute or field specified.
Used in contexts not usually requiring careful use of language in order to avoid giving offence, but humorously regarded as doing so.
| 1982 Washington Post (Nexis) 24 Nov. d8 We serve television for the humor impaired. 1992 Tucson (Arizona) Weekly 23 Sept. 16/1 The presentation is free, which helps if you're also financially impaired. 1994 J. F. Garner Politically Correct Bedtime Stories 70 Jack apparently was a complete sizeist, who thought that all giants were clumsy, knowledge-impaired, and exploitable. 1997 M. Groening et al. Simpsons: Compl. Guide 97/2 Please, Lis, they [sc. the zombies] prefer to be called the living-impaired. 2004 Sunday Mag. (Sydney) (Nexis) 14 Nov. 34 Gorgeous gold Senso slingback heels, $120—perfect for reaching high shelves and pushing over the height-impaired at sale time. |