contractility Meaning, Definition & Usage

noun the capability or quality of shrinking or contracting, especially by muscle fibers and even some other forms of living matter

The quality or property by which bodies shrink or contract.
(Physiol.) The power possessed by the fibers of living muscle of contracting or shortening. ✍ When subject to the will, as in the muscles of locomotion, such power is called voluntary contractility; when not controlled by the will, as in the muscles of the heart, it is involuntary contractility.