childlike

[ chahyld-lahyk ]
See synonyms for childlike on Thesaurus.com
adjective
  1. like a child, as in innocence, frankness, etc.; befitting a child: childlike trust.

Origin of childlike

1
First recorded in 1580–90; child + -like

synonym study For childlike

See childish.

Other words for childlike

Opposites for childlike

Other words from childlike

  • childlikeness, noun
  • un·child·like, adjective

Words that may be confused with childlike

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024

How to use childlike in a sentence

  • Rose was still beautiful, but her face had lost its childlikeness, and gained something more dominant.

    Was It Right to Forgive? | Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
  • His puritanism and his childlikeness only make his teaching more dangerous because more piquant.

    Among Famous Books | John Kelman
  • The childlikeness, the beauty of his nature revealed it in everything he did; and he was only twenty-two years old.

    Fairfax and His Pride | Marie Van Vorst
  • As if there was ever a Celestial who, for all his childlikeness and blandness, was not very wide-awake indeed!

  • This childlikeness, combined with her happy temperament, had kept her singularly contented in her monotonous life.

    Ramona | Helen Hunt Jackson

British Dictionary definitions for childlike

childlike

/ (ˈtʃaɪldˌlaɪk) /


adjective
  1. like or befitting a child, as in being innocent, trustful, etc: Compare childish (def. 2)

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012