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naive
[ nah-eev ]
adjective
- 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.
- having or showing unaffected simplicity of nature or absence of artificiality; unsophisticated; ingenuous.
Synonyms: plain, open, candid, guileless, artless, unaffected, simple
Antonyms: artful, sophisticated
- having or marked by a simple, unaffectedly direct style reflecting little or no formal training or technique:
valuable naive 19th-century American portrait paintings.
- not having previously been the subject of a scientific experiment, as an animal.
naive
/ naɪˈiːv /
adjective
- having or expressing innocence and credulity; ingenuous
- ( as collective noun; preceded by the )
only the naive believed him
- artless or unsophisticated
- lacking developed powers of analysis, reasoning, or criticism
a naive argument
- another word for primitive
noun
- rare.a person who is naive, esp in artistic style See primitive
Usage Note
Derived Forms
- naˈiveness, noun
- naˈively, adverb
Other Words From
- na·ive·ly adverb
- na·ive·ness noun
- un·na·ive adjective
Word History and Origins
Word History and Origins
Origin of naive1
Example Sentences
I was naive enough to assume that he would, at most, rob me.
Artists now consider the Ideal Palace a piece of “naive” or “outsider” art.
She tackles weighty subjects with a naive sensibility and faux-innocence, but skillfully avoids dumbing them down.
I was definitely naive, I think the main similarity between me and Hal is that we were naive.
Maybe you can call it naive but that's the way Shae simply is.
And Jansoulet felt the delight of a child, a plebeian joy, compounded of ignorance and naive vanity.
There was a naturalness in his enjoyment which was almost boylike; a naive sort of exultation possessed him.
Buzonniere, Rochfort and Fangouse are milder and more naive in their demonstrations and their works are of no weight or interest.
A remark which Mendelssohn once made in his peculiar naive manner is very characteristic of him and his opinion of Chopin.
But he got the impression that she was almost fantastically naive.
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