na·ive
or na·ïve (nī-ēv′, nä-) also na·if or na·ïf (nī-ēf′, nä-)adj.1. Lacking worldly experience and understanding, especially:
a. Simple and guileless; artless: a child with a naive charm.
b. Unsuspecting or credulous: naive victims of the scam.
2. Showing or characterized by a lack of sophistication and critical judgment: "this extravagance of metaphors, with its naive bombast" (H.L. Mencken).
3. Not having experienced or been subjected to something, as:
a. Not previously subjected to experiments: testing naive mice.
b. Not having previously taken or received a particular drug: patients naive to antipsychotic medication.
n. One who is artless, credulous, or uncritical.
[French
naïve, feminine of
naïf, from Old French
naif,
natural, native, from Latin
nātīvus,
native, rustic, from
nātus, past participle of
nāscī,
to be born; see
genə- in
Indo-European roots.]
na·ive′ly adv.
na·ive′ness n.
Synonyms: naive, simple, ingenuous, unsophisticated, natural, unaffected, guileless, artless
These adjectives mean free from guile, cunning, or sham. Naive sometimes connotes a credulity that impedes effective functioning in a practical world: "this naive simple creature, with his straightforward and friendly eyes so eager to believe appearances" (Arnold Bennett).
Simple stresses absence of complexity, artifice, pretentiousness, or dissimulation: "Those of highest worth and breeding are most simple in manner and attire" (Francis Parkman)."Among simple people she had the reputation of being a prodigy of information" (Harriet Beecher Stowe).
Ingenuous denotes childlike directness, simplicity, and innocence; it connotes an inability to mask one's feelings: an ingenuous admission of responsibility. Unsophisticated indicates absence of worldliness: the astonishment of unsophisticated tourists at the tall buildings. Natural stresses spontaneity that is the result of freedom from self-consciousness or inhibitions: "When Kavanagh was present, Alice was happy, but embarrassed; Cecilia, joyous and natural" (Henry Wadsworth Longfellow).
Unaffected implies sincerity and lack of affectation: "With men he can be rational and unaffected, but when he has ladies to please, every feature works" (Jane Austen).
Guileless signifies absence of insidious or treacherous cunning: a guileless, disarming look. Artless stresses absence of plan or purpose and suggests unconcern for or lack of awareness of the reaction produced in others: a child of artless grace and simple goodness.
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.