confounding
Americanadjective
-
perplexing or bewildering.
He’s hosting an evening of readings from some of the most sensational and confounding cases of Sherlock Holmes.
-
throwing someone or something into confusion or disorder.
Still in shock, his wife broke the confounding news that their only son had been killed by a stray bullet.
-
Statistics. interacting with both the dependent and independent variables in an experiment or study, making it impossible to determine a causal effect between them.
The authors list potential confounding factors, but it is not clear from the paper whether all of these were controlled for in the analyses.
noun
-
the act of perplexing, bewildering, causing confusion or disorder, etc..
The Jaredite civilization is supposed to have formed in the wake of the miraculous confounding of languages at the Tower of Babel.
-
the act of treating or viewing different things as if they were the same.
I have always found the confounding of Christmas and Hanukkah disturbing.
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of confounding
First recorded in 1425–75; confound ( def. ) + -ing 2 ( def. ) for the adjective senses; confound ( def. ) + -ing 1 ( def. ) for the noun senses
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.
Eli An analyst noted thin details and potential confounding factors.
From Barron's • May 4, 2026
Add it all together, and you’re left with perhaps the most fascinating and confounding player in the sport—the perfect distillation of everything that is beautiful and terribly wrong with the modern game.
From The Wall Street Journal • Apr. 30, 2026
The study is cross-sectional, which means it cannot determine cause and effect and may be influenced by confounding factors or reverse causation.
From Science Daily • Apr. 13, 2026
“Pamela Steele knows how to name the confounding world around us,” fellow Appalachian author Glenn Taylor praised Steele’s new novel.
From Los Angeles Times • Apr. 8, 2026
My willingness to eat confused and annoyed the staff, confounding their efforts to understand what I was doing there.
From "How I Live Now" by Meg Rosoff
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.
