Definition of "influence" []

• A power affecting a person, thing, or course of events, especially one that operates without any direct or apparent effort: relaxed under the influence of the music; the influence of television on modern life. (noun)
• Power to sway or affect based on prestige, wealth, ability, or position: used her parent's influence to get the job. (noun)
• A person who exerts influence: My parents considered my friend to be a bad influence on me. (noun)
• An effect or change produced by influence. (noun)
• A determining factor believed by some to affect individual tendencies and characteristics understood to be caused by the positions of the stars and planets at the time of one's birth. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "This objection, that we non-voters shall lose all our influence, confounds the broad distinction between _influence_ and _power_."
• "Thus the determining influence is not the difference between the large town and the small; and the character of the school depends, not only upon the moral level of its pupils, but above all upon the moral level and the _personal influence_ of the head of the school and the assistant teachers."
• "But equally obviously the main influence is NOT East Asian, as anyone with two eyes and a little sense can see."