scared
Americanadjective
verb
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of scared
Explanation
Have you ever gone into a dark room and heard something scurrying across the floor and felt your pulse quicken and your heart race? You were scared — afraid. When you are scared, you are frightened or alarmed. It can be a momentary thing: hearing a car screech outside your house and worrying that your dog just got hit. It can be longer: you might be scared for weeks or months after a medical diagnosis. While the verb is usually associated with a single person or small group, you might also apply it more generally: a fast-moving tornado could have scared a whole town.
Vocabulary lists containing scared
Emotions on Display
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In the Mood? 100 Words to Describe Emotions
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Hooked on a Feeling, List 1
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
"So, they hire someone like me to accompany them to the hospital. If they had to go alone, they could feel scared or anxious."
From BBC ● Oct. 13, 2026
“I was always running scared that I was going to get sent home,” he says now.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 13, 2026
"It's extremely dystopian and that is something we should be all scared about," she added.
From Barron's ● Oct. 10, 2026
I’m asking because New York’s most historically entitled, championship-gorged baseball club has a crisis: no one’s scared of them anymore.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 9, 2026
The man, scared to death, fell off his donkey and ran for his life.
From "Adventures of Don Quixote" by Argentina Palacios
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Get a wordDefinitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
