<Tr> <Td> </Td> <Td> Look up make a mountain out of a molehill in Wiktionary, the free dictionary . </Td> </Tr> <P> Making a mountain out of a molehill is an idiom referring to over-reactive, histrionic behaviour where a person makes too much of a minor issue . It seems to have come into existence in the 16th century . </P> <P> The idiom is a metaphor for the common behaviour of responding disproportionately to something - usually an adverse circumstance . One who "makes a mountain out of a molehill" is said to be greatly exaggerating the severity of the situation . In cognitive psychology, this form of distortion is called magnification or overreacting . The phrase itself is so common that a study by psychologists found that with respect to familiarity and image value, it ranks high among the 203 common sayings they tested . </P> <P> Similar idioms include' Much ado about nothing' and' Making a song and dance about nothing' . The meaning finds its opposite in the fable about the mountain in labour that gives birth to a mouse . In the former too much is made of little; in the latter one is led to expect much, but with too little result . The two appear to converge in William Caxton's translation of the fable (1484), where he makes of the mountain a hylle whiche beganne to tremble and shake by cause of the molle whiche delved it . In other words, he mimics the meaning of the fable by turning a mountain into a molehill . It was in the context of this bringing together of the two ideas that the English idiom grew . </P>

Meaning of idiom make a mountain out of a molehill