Reflex

Part of speech: noun (n.)

1. Reflection; the light reflected from an illuminated surface to one in shade. Yon gray is not the morning's eye, 'Tis but the pale reflex of Cynthia's brow. Shak. On the depths of death there swims The reflex of a human face. Tennyson.

2. An involuntary movement produced by reflex action. Patellar reflex. See Knee jerk, under Knee.

Part of speech: verb (v.)

1. To reflect. [Obs.] Shak.

2. To bend back; to turn back. J. Gregory.

Part of speech: adjective (a.)

1. Directed back; attended by reflection; retroactive; introspective. The reflex act of the soul, or the turning of the intellectual eye inward upon its own actions. Sir M. Hale.

2. Produced in reaction, in resistance, or in return.

3. Of, pertaining to, or produced by, stimulus or excitation without the necessary intervention of consciousness. Reflex action (Physiol.), any action performed involuntarily in consequence of an impulse or impression transmitted along afferent nerves to a nerve center, from which it is reflected to an efferent nerve, and so calls into action certain muscles, organs, or cells. -- Reflex nerve (Physiol.), an excito-motory nerve. See Exito- motory.