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# prevalence

«prevalence» in Mova's school dictionary: **in a place or group at a given time** — its meaning for a pupil, its sense in the lessons and examples.

### part of speech

noun (prevalence, uncountable)

### meaning for a pupil

How common or widespread something is in a place or group at a given time. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/P/prevalence/#m1)

### sense in the lessons

Used in science, health and news: «the prevalence of asthma in children», «the prevalence of mobile phones». In maths and statistics, prevalence is often given as a percentage or a fraction of a group.

### examples

- The prevalence of head lice goes up when school starts. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/P/prevalence/#x1)
- The survey studied the prevalence of short-sightedness. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/P/prevalence/#x2)
- The prevalence of smartphones has changed how people talk. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/P/prevalence/#x3)
- Scientists measured the prevalence of the disease. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/P/prevalence/#x4)
- The prevalence of plastic on beaches is shocking. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/P/prevalence/#x5)
- Allergies have a higher prevalence than they used to. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/P/prevalence/#x6)

### note

Uncountable. Adjective: prevalent. In maths: if 20 out of 100 children have glasses, the prevalence is 20%, or 1 in 5. Not the same as «incidence», which counts new cases in a time period.

### Trees and pragmatics

[Every meaning and example of «prevalence» parsed by Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/P/prevalence/), each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.