adversely
Americanadverb
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of adversely
Explanation
When something affects you adversely, it's harmful or negative. Holding a cinder block will adversely affect your running speed. When you talk about things that are acting adversely, they are harming something or holding it back in some way. Not getting enough sleep will adversely affect your performance in school. Rain will adversely affect an outdoor wedding. Anything that's making things worse instead of better is adversely influencing the situation. Adversely means something close to badly or harmfully. So when you see this word, you know something is going wrong.
Vocabulary lists containing adversely
Florida's B.E.S.T. Common Suffixes: -ly
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167 Vocabulary words from the Supreme Court's DOMA Decision
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Vocabulary from the Seventh Democratic Debate, March 6, 2016
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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.
"His actions constituted significant corruption and adversely affected US interests in Fiji."
From Barron's ● Oct. 7, 2026
Cordova also shared an independent report the company commissioned from consulting firm Roux Associates, which he said “found no evidence in the administrative record ... demonstrating that the site adversely affects public health.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 3, 2026
Etihad, City's main sponsor since 2009, also said it was given no opportunity to engage in a process that now reflects "adversely on the airline".
From BBC ● Sep. 30, 2026
"We undertook this study to determine if vanillin, a flavor chemical often used in e-cigarettes at high concentrations, could adversely affect the development of young embryos in humans."
From Science Daily ● Aug. 28, 2026
Some very recent work indicates that reproduction of birds may be adversely affected by these and certain other herbicides at levels far below those that cause death.
From "Silent Spring" by Rachel Carson
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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.
