Word Pronunciation & Dictionary

go negative

Word Rarity Uncommon

Frequency: Zipf frequency 4.77 in modern English

Syllables: go neg-a-tive
IPA

15

Scrabble Score

10

Letters

3

Syllables

8

Unique Chars

Meaning

verb

To focus on attacking political opponents rather than promoting oneself.

American usage

Example Sentences

"After losing several primaries and facing a campaign debt of $250,000, his associates persuaded him to go negative."
"All four of the principle candidates in the 2008 presidential election “went negative” in their acceptance addresses."
"The goal of this chapter is to situate our work in the broader literature on negative campaigning, as well as to address a key question: why do candidates have to go negative?"
"We also found that gubernatorial candidates went negative on Twitter."

Usage

American usage

Inflected Forms

goes negative (present, singular) going negative (participle, present) went negative (past) gone negative (participle, past)

Questions

What does go negative mean?: To focus on attacking political opponents rather than promoting oneself.

How to pronounce go negative

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