oikofugic

[ersatz-read.livejournal.com]

oikofugic, adj.  Relating to or characterized by the desire to travel, migrate, play truant, etc.

Etymology:  from Greek οίκος (house) + fugere (flee).
Unlike most words in use in English, this one seems to have a singular origin and narrow use:
the word (along with oikotropic) appears to have been coined by American psychologist Granville Stanley Hall in 1905. 
(Hall is also credited with creating scientific terms for two varieties of tickling.)

Oikofugic and oikotropic are still in use today, but almost exclusively in psychology texts, and often in direct reference to Hall's work.

"These two opposite instincts, which we may dub oikotropic and oikofugic, between which the soul oscillates especially in youth, suggest again atavistic psychic stratifications, and also a once earlier pubescence." - G. S. Hall (1905), Adolescence:  Its psychology and its relations to physiology, anthropology, sociology, sex, crime, religion and education, volume 2.

"A nineteenth century American psychologist suggested that human beings might have both an oikotropic and an oikofugic instinct:  One keeps us homebound, safe, and secure; the other sends us away, in search for the unknown." - Andreea Deciu Ritivoi (2002), Yesterday's Self:  Nostalgia and the Immigrant Society.

Comments

[prettygoodword.livejournal.com]

Would that be pronounced EE-koh- or OI-koh-? (Or even EH-koh-, given it's the same root as economic.)

---L.

[ersatz-read.livejournal.com]

The Century Dictionary and Encyclopedia from 1911 says it's oi-koh (http://books.google.com/books?id=dhTpAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA4358&lpg=PA4358&dq=oikofugic&source=bl&ots=xwpN7yXEjd&sig=wyTuOT8O33T31COFjjJpIGln4kU&hl=en&sa=X&ei=WyQhUMDPLqrg2wXkqICQCA&ved=0CDcQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=oikofugic&f=false).

[prettygoodword.livejournal.com]

Gracias.