MEANING
A group’s established customs and expectations about acceptable behavior, especially those reflecting shared values.
Use it for
discussing changing social expectations; interpreting conduct within a community’s customary values; comparing accepted behavior across periods or groups; distinguishing group conventions from an individual habitNames the customary behavioral expectations that embody a group’s values, not merely any repeated individual habit. Writing functions: Theory / Social interpretation, Analysis / Interpretation, Comparison / Contrast.
Words that belong together
- social mores
- changing sexual mores
- the mores of a community
On the page
The letters reveal a conflict between metropolitan mores and the expectations of the village.
Her reading of the scandal attends to contemporary social mores rather than assuming a timeless standard.
Word forms
- Base
- mores
Usage notes
Plural noun with the headword mores. It is not an ordinary plural of more and has no usual singular in modern English. Do not invent a singular English mos. Register: formal. Commonness: uncommon (qualitative editorial estimate, informed by dictionaries/corpus).
Practice this word in a sentenceYour margin notes
Keep a thought for later. Sign in to save privately.