misbehave
Americanverb (used without object)
-
misbehaves,
present (3rd person singular)
-
misbehaved,
past participle, past
-
misbehaving
present participle
verb (used with object)
-
misbehaves,
present (3rd person singular)
-
misbehaved,
past participle, past
-
misbehaving
present participle
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
misbehavesimple
-
misbehavessimple
-
have misbehavedperfect
-
has misbehavedperfect
-
am misbehavingprogressive
-
are misbehavingprogressive
-
is misbehavingprogressive
-
have been misbehavingperfect progressive
-
has been misbehavingperfect progressive
Past
-
misbehavedsimple
-
had misbehavedperfect
-
was misbehavingprogressive
-
were misbehavingprogressive
-
had been misbehavingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of misbehave
late Middle English word dating back to 1425–75; see origin at mis- 1, behave
Explanation
When you misbehave, you do something bad. One way to misbehave would be to stand on the roof of your house and throw water balloons at people walking by. Kids are probably most often said to misbehave, although adults misbehave at least as often. A bank executive, for example, might misbehave by embezzling money, and a politician misbehaves when she lies under oath. The meaning of the word is clear once you know that the prefix mis- means "bad or wrong," from Old English. When you combine it with behave, you get bad behavior.
Vocabulary lists containing misbehave
List 5
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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.
See Examples For:
He explained that people might misbehave if the cameras were present.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 29, 2026
They may even feel emboldened to misbehave again.
From Slate ● Jun. 8, 2026
Prodigy City is located in what was formerly Thailand, where the series was filmed, giving every character, human and otherwise, plenty of space to hide and misbehave.
From Salon ● Aug. 5, 2025
The school asks parents to come into lessons and sit next to their child if they misbehave in class.
From BBC ● Feb. 17, 2025
The more I think about it, an embargo sounds an awful lot like the punishment chair at home whenever we misbehave.
From "Before We Were Free" by Julia Alvarez
Forty-seven years later, we see artificial intelligence making such decisions with too little thought from the humans who will likely have to accept the financial fallout if the model misbehaves.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 4, 2026
Discipline is about teaching children how to behave, communicate and regulate their emotions, not, for example, losing your temper when a child misbehaves.
From Washington Post ● Nov. 29, 2022
In addition, he said he wanted to see an end to Section 21 evictions, which occur when a tenant misbehaves or the landlord wishes to stop renting.
From BBC ● Oct. 30, 2022
In addition to lights, you can even set one up to do something handy like remotely power-cycling your home router when it inevitably misbehaves — even without having to get up from the couch.
From The Verge ● Jun. 24, 2022
The man who misbehaves himself in uniform in public creates a bad impression of the whole command, as a result of which his comrades must suffer.
From Manual of Military Training Second, Revised Edition by James A. (James Alfred) Moss
She says if a child misbehaved or a class got too hectic, it was often her daughter who was told to leave the room because she could not cope in the situation.
From BBC ● Dec. 30, 2025
In 1934, Alcatraz opened as an official federal prison for men who had made escape attempts from other federal prisons, or otherwise misbehaved.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 5, 2025
The latest developments in the ongoing tribal dispute come on the heels of the backlash Noem faced for writing about killing a hunting dog that misbehaved in her latest book.
From Seattle Times ● May 11, 2024
They also said Mr. Crumbley, now 17, had misbehaved in jail, calling “into question whether this defendant can ever be rehabilitated.”
From New York Times ● Jul. 27, 2023
I misbehaved, becoming nervous and fidgety, daydreaming and moving around as I stared into space.
From "March Forward, Girl" by Melba Pattillo Beals
A top lawmaker from Australia's far-right One Nation party has grabbed headlines after exploding at a misbehaving dog as he was grilled on live TV.
From Barron's ● Jul. 21, 2026
Once I was taking the kids to SeaWorld and they were misbehaving in the car.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 4, 2026
There has always been salacious gossip about the royal family, and misbehaving royals, but this time it felt much worse.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 31, 2025
The police have also opened a hotline for people to report "misbehaving monks".
From BBC ● Jul. 16, 2025
He was saying it for Mother, to define the moment: I was a misbehaving child; he was setting the child right.
From "Educated" by Tara Westover
Definitions 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.
