behaviour

American  

[bih-heyv-yer] / bɪˈheɪv yər /

noun

Chiefly British.

1. behavior.

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behaviour British  

/ bɪˈheɪvjə /

noun

1. manner of behaving or conducting oneself

2. behaving with careful good manners

3. psychol

   1. the aggregate of all the responses made by an organism in any situation

   2. a specific response of a certain organism to a specific stimulus or group of stimuli

4. the action, reaction, or functioning of a system, under normal or specified circumstances

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Spelling

See -or ¹.

Other Word Forms

• behavioural adjective

Etymology

Origin of behaviour

C15: from _behave ; influenced in form by Middle English havior , from Old French havoir , from Latin habēre to have

Example Sentences

For her, it offers both a reason for her son's behaviour and a solution.

From BBC • Apr. 5, 2026

Wrack said: "We have a masculinity crisis brewing in our schools. Teachers desperately need increased support to deal with this new frontier of behaviour management."

From BBC • Apr. 4, 2026

Police responded to reports of anti-social behaviour involving a group of "several hundred young people" last weekend in Clapham, south London.

From BBC • Apr. 3, 2026

That behaviour addiction was observed by one mother, who told BBC News NI ofhow her daughter, now 15, developed an "obsession" with her smartphone and social media.

From BBC • Apr. 3, 2026

Such dramatic changes in behaviour would occur only if something changed in the chimpanzees’ DNA.

From "Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind" by Yuval Noah Harari