Aggravate and mitigate are antonyms, which are words that have opposite meanings to each other. We will look at the definitions of the words aggravate and mitigate, where these words come from and some examples of their use in sentences.
Aggravate means to make a situation, problem or injury worse, to render something more severe or serious. The word aggravate may be used in an informal manner to mean to exasperate someone, to annoy someone. The word aggravate is derived from the Latin word aggravatus which means to make more troublesome. Aggravate is a transitive verb, which is a verb that takes an object. Related words are aggravates, aggravated, aggravating, aggravation.
Mitigate means to ease a situation, problem or injury, to render something less severe or serious, to moderate a negative impact. The word mitigate is derived from the Latin word mitigatus, which means to tame, to soften. Mitigate is also a transitive verb, related words are mitigates, mitigated, mitigating, mitigation. Remember, aggravate describes the act of making something worse, mitigate describes the act of making something better.
Examples
“Therefore it is important to note that future warming may aggravate water scarcity and air conditioning /cooling demand at a local level,” Srinivas and Dhanya Praveen, another scientist working at EPTRI, said in their research paper presented recently. (Siasat Daily)
Low voter turnout has always baffled and aggravated me, but I certainly can’t blame voters who’ve become disillusioned with bad politicians, broken promises, and the wall-to-wall negativity that seemingly permeates the whole political landscape. (The Chillicothe News)
Long queues are forming outside branches because ATMs and post offices have completely failed in mitigating the disaster. (The Times of India)