culpable.

Responsible for wrongdoing or a failure in a way that deserves blame.

Use it for

Words that belong together

• culpable negligence
• culpable failure

On the page

The inquiry found a culpable failure to act on repeated warnings.

Usage notes

Primary category: psychology / human behavior. Forms: Comparative more culpable; superlative most culpable when comparison is meaningful. Legacy lexical fields mirror sense 1 only. Use numbered sense fields for all meanings. Established modern English lexical item. No separate regional spelling or grammatical inflection entry. Commonness: moderately common.