naive
Americanadjective
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having or showing a lack of experience, judgment, or information; credulous.
She's so naive she believes everything she reads.
He has a very naive attitude toward politics.
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having or showing unaffected simplicity of nature or absence of artificiality; unsophisticated; ingenuous.
- Antonyms:
- artful, sophisticated
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having or marked by a simple, unaffectedly direct style reflecting little or no formal training or technique.
valuable naive 19th-century American portrait paintings.
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not having previously been the subject of a scientific experiment, as an animal.
adjective
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having or expressing innocence and credulity; ingenuous
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( as collective noun; preceded by the )
only the naive believed him
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artless or unsophisticated
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lacking developed powers of analysis, reasoning, or criticism
a naive argument
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another word for primitive
noun
Usage
This word is spelled with a dieresis over the i (ï) in French, indicating that it is a separate vowel sound. Many people retain this spelling when writing in English.
Other Word Forms
- naively adverb
- naiveness noun
- unnaive adjective
Etymology
Origin of naive
First recorded in 1645–55; from French, feminine of naïf, Old French naif “natural, instinctive,” from Latin nātīvus native
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
“I can’t believe you thought that the ocean was going to disappear. I mean—really! How could you be so naive?”
From Literature
“I’d be naive to think that everybody doesn’t understand that,” Sullivan said.
Indisputably courageous, she is also young, naive and at times overmatched by circumstances.
From Los Angeles Times
"More naive. Everything became different. I became different."
From BBC
"I was naive, foolish, and gullible to put any trust in Jeffrey Epstein," he said.
From BBC
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
