Concentrate I Concentrated Verb ˈkɒnsntreɪt ˈkɑːnsntreɪt Noise Struggled

• i can't concentrate with all that noise going on.
• i struggled to concentrate on my job because i was worried about my son.
• she tried to concentrate on reading her book but couldn't.
• nothing concentrates the mind better than the knowledge that you could die tomorrow (= it makes you think very clearly).

concentrate

Verb Forms

1. to give all your attention to something and not think about anything else
• I can't concentrate with all that noise going on.
• I struggled to concentrate on my job because I was worried about my son.
• She tried to concentrate on reading her book but couldn't.
• Nothing concentrates the mind better than the knowledge that you could die tomorrow (= it makes you think very clearly).
• After 1926 she concentrated her energies on her medical practice.
• I decided to concentrate all my efforts on finding somewhere to live.

Extra Examples

• I tried to work but I found I couldn't concentrate.
• I was tired and couldn't concentrate properly.
• She was sitting at her desk concentrating hard.
• She tried to concentrate, but her thoughts kept drifting back to the day before.
• We were told to concentrate on a black dot in the middle of the screen.
• We're concentrating even harder on giving quality service this year.
2. to bring something together in one place
• Power is largely concentrated in the hands of a small elite.
• We need to concentrate resources on the most run-down areas.
• Fighting was concentrated around the towns to the north.
• Never concentrate the heat in one place for too long.

Extra Examples

• These jobs are disproportionately concentrated in the service sector.
• The immigrant community is strongly concentrated geographically.
• Most of the country's industry is concentrated in the north.
3. to increase the strength of a substance by reducing its volume, for example by boiling it
• SYNONYM reduce
  https://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/definition/english/reduce

Word Origin

• mid 17th cent. (in the sense ‘bring towards a centre’): Latinized form of concentre, fromcon- ‘together’ + centrum ‘centre’ or from French concentrer ‘to concentrate’. Sense (1) dates from the early 20th cent.