soft in the head

Idioms and Phrases

Mentally deficient; also, silly, foolish. For example, He's nice enough but a bit soft in the head . The soft in this idiom, first recorded in 1775, alludes to a weakness in mental capacity.

Example Sentences

“Ain't his fault he's soft in the head.”

From Literature

One of the workmen, a bit soft in the head, couldn’t help nodding in agreement.

From Literature

Bouloukos is a secret weapon of independent cinema; he was on my best-of list for 2013, for his supporting role in Nathan Silver’s feature “Soft in the Head,” in which he played a group-home resident who dominates the facility’s atmosphere with his smoldering silence and explosive rage.

From The New Yorker

The pregnant girls marked their babies or didn’t, but the grandfathers—unwarned—went soft in the head, walked out of the syrup house, left their beds in the shank of the night, wet themselves, forgot the names of their grown children and where they’d put their razor strops.

From Literature

"I think you've got to be a bit soft in the head with their policies," he claimed.

From BBC