MEANING
1. So firmly established in someone’s habits, beliefs, or behaviour that change is difficult.
2. Worked into a surface so deeply that it is difficult to remove.
Use it for
showing a habit persisting despite a conscious decision; describing an assumption learned too deeply to notice; distinguishing entrenched behaviour from a passing moodConveys habits or assumptions that have become difficult to dislodge, with a separate literal sense of embedded dirt. Writing functions: Psychological States.
Words that belong together
- an ingrained habit
- deeply ingrained prejudice
- ingrained patterns of behaviour
On the page
The apology came at once, an ingrained reflex rather than an admission of fault.
Her ingrained caution survived every assurance that the house was safe.
Ingrained dirt darkened the grooves of the wooden handle.
The apron was clean, but the cuffs retained an ingrained grey stain.
Word forms
- Base
- ingrained
Usage notes
Established adjective, not a new finite verb. Usually deeply ingrained or ingrained in; more deeply ingrained is natural. No invented ingrainer/ingrainest forms. Register: neutral. Commonness: moderately common (qualitative editorial estimate, informed by dictionaries/corpus).
Practice this word in a sentenceYour margin notes
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