What's the difference between perfunctory and superficial?

Perfunctory


Definition:

  • (a.) Done merely to get rid of a duty; performed mechanically and as a thing of rote; done in a careless and superficial manner; characterized by indifference; as, perfunctory admonitions.
  • (a.) Hence: Mechanical; indifferent; listless; careless.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) The apparent lack of "anything to do" can discourage physicians from attempting anything more than perfunctory management of these cases.
  • (2) Refugees scramble for ways into Europe as Hungary seals borders Read more Habbal was one of at least 16 applicants to be rejected on Tuesday, and he claimed that each person was turned down in a maximum 20 minutes, after a series of perfunctory questions about their country of origin and route to Hungary.
  • (3) From the peak of potential perfection you descend down through "going to the toilet with the door open", past "perfunctory sex" and into "cold, dead stares across the breakfast table".
  • (4) The visit though will remain perfunctory, reflecting the troubled relationship.
  • (5) Instead it pushed through Lord Mandelson's wrong-headed digital economy bill, which only got its perfunctory Commons second reading yesterday, as well as the unavoidable budget resolutions.
  • (6) Social care is in crisis, leaving half a million frail old people with no care at all, while others get notoriously perfunctory 15-minute home visits or often squalid residential care.
  • (7) You could never accuse Frank Lowy of not caring enough about Australian football, but in his press conference announcing Postecoglou as coach there was a warmth and an avuncularity that had been missing in his more perfunctory public interactions with Osieck, Verbeek and even Hiddink.
  • (8) In a brilliant coincidence, he was also there to collect them all, rewarding all the fans who voted on social media with a fairly perfunctory performance of What Do You Mean?
  • (9) The process for deciding that the war was legal is described as “perfunctory” by the inquiry, while “no formal record was made of that decision, and the precise grounds on which it was made remains unclear”.
  • (10) These were the days when, other than perfunctory call-ups by prison staff, there was little focus on the motivations behind so-called offending behaviour.
  • (11) "The North's film-makers are just doing perfunctory work.
  • (12) Nursing home physicians are often unprepared to make psychiatric diagnoses, and a perfunctory annual psychiatric evaluation is insufficient to manage the complex depression syndromes of nursing home residents.
  • (13) If this could be attained, the hours in a hospital on rounds or at lectures would be better spent and ultimately, the speaker, too, would derive more satisfaction from his work if he were rewarded with stimulating questions from an appreciative audience instead of the perfunctory applause of somnolent, noncomprehending colleagues, driven almost to distraction by unending cacolalia complicated by lightning speed and rank inaudibility.
  • (14) Savile was given only a "perfunctory" interview, conducted on his terms at Stoke Mandeville ("not good practice") and with a friend present, about whose status officers did not inquire.
  • (15) All the approaches to Baghdad are defended by a mix of state security forces and Shia militiamen, most of whom have had several perfunctory days of training before being dispatched to the frontline.
  • (16) He's saying that the EIB is "part of the Brussels racket"; that BA was a major recipient of the bank's soft loans because it tried to steer Britain into the euro (must have been a bad job); that "everyone knows" that Britain is in a worse economic state than everyone else (oddly enough he cites Brussels as a source) and that our "wooden and perfunctory" PM is "pathologically incapable" of apologising for his mistakes.
  • (17) The inquiry also heard how Dorrell thought the framework for the fledgling PCC, which was set up in 1991, was "vague", "perfunctory" and lacking in any "real sanctions".
  • (18) The news is heartbreaking for the families involved and it will be scarcely believable for these hospitals and GPs who are doing their best to deliver services despite the neglect of the government.” He said that Hunt’s statement to MPs last July was “perfunctory, complacent and evasive, failing to reveal any of the catastrophic detail of how 500,000 pieces of correspondence including test and screening results and pathways following hospital treatment, had failed to be delivered and were in fact languishing unopened in a warehouse”.
  • (19) There’s a terrific documentary about one such case, the Detroit band Death whose sole album was released in a perfunctory edition in, I believe, 1975 and disappeared until a copy of it was digitised and made public on the internet.
  • (20) Most important, the history and physical examination are often perfunctory and the patient undergoes a number of contrast and imaging studies, endoscopic procedures, and laboratory investigations which may still be non-diagnostic.

Superficial


Definition:

  • (a.) Of or pertaining to the superficies, or surface; lying on the surface; shallow; not deep; as, a superficial color; a superficial covering; superficial measure or contents; superficial tillage.
  • (a.) Reaching or comprehending only what is obvious or apparent; not deep or profound; shallow; -- said especially in respect to study, learning, and the like; as, a superficial scholar; superficial knowledge.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) A simple method of selective catheterization of the superficial femoral artery (SFA) following antegrade puncture of the common femoral artery is described.
  • (2) Are you ready to vote?” is the battle cry, and even the most superficial of glances at the statistics tells why.
  • (3) These data suggest that basophilic cell function in the superficial mucous layer in the nose is of greater significance in the development of nasal symptoms in response to nasal allergy than either mucociliary activity or nasal mucosal hypersensitivity to histamine.
  • (4) After haemorrhage in conscious rabbits total renal blood flow fell by 25%, this fall being confined to the superficial renal cortex.
  • (5) This was followed firstly by superficial and then by deep ulceration of the mucosa.
  • (6) The soleus, deep portions of the vastus lateralis, and superficial portions of the vastus lateralis muscles were examined to represent slow-twitch-oxidative, fast-twitch-oxidative-glycolytic, and fast-twitch-glycolytic skeletal muscle fiber types, respectively.
  • (7) The normal anatomical position of the point of junction of the superficial cerebral veins with the superior sagittal and transverse sinuses of the rat was studied with an analytical mathematical method.
  • (8) Tinea versicolor was the commonest superficial dermatomycosis affecting nearly half of all adults seen.
  • (9) It is concluded that catechol potentiates excitatory transmission at the LOT-superficial pyramidal cell synapse, possibly by increasing evoked transmitter release.
  • (10) This study presents data supporting a selective antinociceptive role for DA at the spinal level, where it has a widespread antinociceptive influence, on cells in both the superficial and deeper dorsal horn.
  • (11) In fact the deep femoral artery represents an exceptional and privileged route for anastomosis that is capable of replacing almost perfectly an obstructed superficial femoral artery and also in a more limited way femoro-popliteal arteries with extensive obstructions.
  • (12) Superficial x-ray therapy is an excellent modality for the treatment of squamous cell carcinomas of the lower extremity in the elderly.
  • (13) This suggests a possible depressant effect of both GABA and taurine at superficial cortical layers.
  • (14) CD8 positive cells were detected randomly in all regions of the mucosa, whereas CD4 positive cells tended to be clustered in the superficial portion of the lamina propria.
  • (15) Comparing the tolerable side-effects with their favourable therapeutic results, BCG is considered to be suitable for the prevention of recurrences in treating superficial bladder tumours.
  • (16) This study concluded that inverted positioning for short periods significantly increased spinal length and reduced emg activity of the superficial lumbar area musculature of normal males.
  • (17) No common aetiological factor could be found, although four of these patients did have a mild or moderatley active superficial chronic gastritis.
  • (18) Disturbance of bone metabolism is observed in both the superficial (delta) and slow exchanges (Ve), which are also significantly decreased.
  • (19) The results showed that dogfish lenses developed superficial opacities due to near-UV exposure.
  • (20) The neighbouring neocortical areas receive afferents neither from the mediodorsal nucleus of the thalamus nor from the ventral mesencephalic tegmentum; their catecholamine innervation is mainly confined to the superficial layers and appears to be of noradrenergic nature.