Meanings
plural psocopterans
- Any insect of the order Psocoptera.
The psocopterans most readers are likely to encounter seem more social parasites than social.
2006, James T. Costa, The Other Insect Societies, page 1932 more examples
Thrips probably evolved from primitive Psocopterans approximately 250 million years ago.[…]The Liposcelidae include the common "book lice" (Liposcelis) psocopterans, which are wingless and also found in mammal nests.
2002, Niles Eldredge, Life on Earth, page 152Psocoptera and Phthiraptera are paraphyletic with respect to each other (Yoshizawa & Johnson 2006; Kjer et al. 2006) but the suborders Psocomorpha and Trogiomorpha, which contain most of the common species of psocopterans, do appear to be monophyletic (Yoshizawa 2002).
2009, Ian Christopher Stocks, Comparative Morphological and Functional Analysis of Wing Coupling and ..., page 13Synonyms: bark fly, bark louse, book louse, psocid
Synonyms & antonyms
nounAny insect of the order Psocoptera.
Origin
From translingual Psocoptera + -an.
Full word history & related roots →Translations
Chinese Mandarin 齧蟲 /啮虫
- 齧蟲 /啮虫 (nièchóng)insect of the order Psocoptera
Finnish jäytiäinen
- jäytiäineninsect of the order Psocoptera
Greek ψωχόπτερο, ψωκόπτερο
- ψωχόπτερο (psochóptero)insect of the order Psocoptera
- ψωκόπτερο (psokóptero)insect of the order Psocoptera
Italian psocottero
- psocotteroinsect of the order Psocoptera
Russian сеное́д
- сеное́д (senojéd)insect of the order Psocoptera
Spanish psocóptero
- psocópteroinsect of the order Psocoptera
Cite this entry
psocopteran. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/psocopteran
“psocopteran.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/psocopteran. Accessed November 3, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “psocopteran,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/psocopteran.
Source: psocopteran on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.