involuntary
Many workers claimed that they were involuntarily exposed to secondhand smoke.
Her arms and legs began to shake involuntarily.
The law made it easier to involuntarily commit the mentally ill to a psychiatric hospital.

SMART Vocabulary: related words and phrases

Not expected or planned
abrupt end
abrupt halt
abruptly
abruptness
ad hoc
inadvertence
inadvertency
inadvertent
inadvertently
inconceivable
sine die
spirit
spontaneity
spontaneous
spontaneously
unsuspected
untimely
untoward
unwilled
unwitting

Examples of involuntarily

involuntarily
One thus gets the effect that new developments are screened out, involuntarily, simply because they cannot gather enough momentum for change.
I assume as well that the involuntarily mobile will tend to be worse off than the involuntarily immobile.
He can only waive his liberty-right altogether involuntarily, that is, by not making any choice at all.
This makes it possible for liquid stools to be eliminated involuntarily through an inhibited sphincter mechanism.
We may act involuntarily, against our better judgement.
Mention of the term convivencia can cause eyes to roll involuntarily and make stomachs churn.
Involuntarily, children may learn songs sung by the music therapist or visiting musicians, and they can improve their rhythmic skills by practising during improvisational sessions.
Religious orders placed a high value on voluntary poverty and the laity, many of whom were involuntarily poor, admired them for it.
A few moments later my attention refocuses involuntarily on a friend greeting me and a short conversation follows.
The ink-craving was upon her, and her fingers involuntarily crooked themselves round an imaginary pen.
In view of this the couples interviewed cannot be regarded as being representative of childless couples in general, nor even of involuntarily childless couples.
These two women partnered, voluntarily or involuntarily, with local gangsters to squeeze out a living.
The caretakers (and researchers) are often bilingual themselves and hence set up the stage, however involuntarily, for mixed language.
Claims to civic care will usually succeed only where the need for it is seen as involuntarily engendered.
This statement supports the general impression that children are mostly forced to join or are recruited involuntarily.
See all examples of involuntarily
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