Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary - pathology

 noun  (plural -gies)  Etymology: New Latin pathologia & Middle French pathologie, from Greek pathologia study of the emotions, from path- + -logia -logy  Date: 1611  1. the study of the essential nature of diseases and especially of the structural and functional changes produced by them  2. something abnormal:  a. the structural and functional deviations from the normal that constitute disease or characterize a particular disease  b. deviation from propriety or from an assumed normal state of something nonliving or nonmaterial  c. deviation giving rise to social ills connections between these pathologies…and crime — Wendy Kaminer