Thesaurus results for INSTINCTS

instincts

noun

plural of instinct

as in tendencies

a usually innate ability or desire to perform a specific activity Pouncing on mice is a cat's natural instinct. We needed all of our survival instincts to make it through the weeks lost at sea.

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Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Recent Examples of instincts There’s a certain incompressible amount of time that’s required for your brain to absorb and get past the first instincts. — Roxana Hadadi, Vulture, 21 Oct. 2026 Yook plays Han Sun-woo, a legal intern who would rather be designing jewelry and who trusts his instincts over logic. — Naman Ramachandran, Variety, 21 Oct. 2026 But the director’s crowd-pleasing instincts had devolved into cutesy self-congratulation by the time his wildly overpraised, Holocaust-trivializing satire Jojo Rabbit came along. — David Rooney, HollywoodReporter, 20 Oct. 2026 Most of his instincts are sound and align with fundamental changes in the international system and in American public opinion. — Charles Kupchan, Foreign Affairs, 19 Oct. 2026 Harrison loves this business, consumes it and has terrific instincts. — Matt Grobar, Deadline, 19 Oct. 2026 His early competitive instincts were honed in battles with his equally intense father. — Patrick Z. McGavin, Chicago Tribune, 14 Oct. 2026 There, the nationalist instincts driving Rubio’s speech found more vociferous expression. — Ishaan Tharoor, New Yorker, 14 Oct. 2026 Armstrong also followed his instincts and focused on theme instead of maximum drama. — Stuart Miller, Los Angeles Times, 14 Oct. 2026

Recent Examples of Synonyms for instincts

Noun

Good and bad tendencies overlap and swirl — the Gators, a new property every week.

— Noah White, Miami Herald, 23 Oct. 2026
Shultz claims Holmes spotted Balwani’s abusive tendencies and clocked him as the perfect fall guy if things went south.

— Emily St. Martin, Los Angeles Times, 20 Oct. 2026

Definition of tendencies

Noun

The Basketmaker—whose skills go far beyond furniture making—weaves her a match, Fiddler on the Roof-like, and the Fisherwoman, after an awkward matrimonial moment, takes Wicker Husband home to her funky little cottage.

— Valerie Monroe, Allure, 23 Oct. 2026
After Charlie left Analog World, his mother followed right after him into the box, but her navigation skills prove not to be as true.

— Scott Tobias, Vulture, 23 Oct. 2026

Definition of skills

Noun

And a lot of the time, people who have these kinds of inclinations towards children are people who were children who were abused themselves.

— CT Jones, Rolling Stone, 25 Sep. 2026
The trustees feared that if something happened to him, his heir apparent, Robert Kahn, would replace him, and it was known that Kahn had Zionistic inclinations.

— Literary Hub, Literary Hub, 22 Sep. 2026

Definition of inclinations

Noun

Those impulses may have been shaped not by paranoia, but by evolution, as a way of staving off sickness in an uncertain world.

— Jonathan Lambert, NPR, 23 Oct. 2026
The idea that there are huge positive benefits from AI at scale seems to have come back to the forefront, rather than some of the doomer impulses that maybe a year or two ago were there.

— Nilay Patel, The Verge, 22 Oct. 2026

Definition of impulses

Noun

If there aren’t personal dispositions from an ethical or medical perspective, there is no reason to completely omit any ingredient from one’s diet.

— Rebecca Firkser, Bon Appetit Magazine, 22 Oct. 2026
Knowledge of the enemy’s dispositions can only be obtained from other men.

— Ethan Teekah, Encyclopedia Britannica, 11 Sep. 2026

Definition of dispositions

Browse Nearby Words

instinctively

instincts

instinctual

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“Instincts.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/instincts. Accessed 27 Oct. 2026.

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Synonyms of instincts

noun

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