nurture
/ˈnɜːɹ.t͡ʃəɹ/
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 3.31 in modern English
7
Scrabble Score
7
Letters
2
Syllables
5
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
The environmental influences that contribute to a person’s development (as opposed to "nature").
Countable; Uncountable
noun
The act or process of encouraging the growth or development of something.
Countable; Uncountable
verb
To encourage, especially the growth or development of something.
Example Sentences
- "Other great houses there bee of the English in Ireland, which thorough licentious conversing with the Irish, or marrying, or fostering with them, or lacke of meete nurture, or other such unhappy occasions, have degendred from their auncient dignities, and are now growne as Irish, as O-hanlans breech, as the proverbe there is."
- "A Deuill, a borne-Deuill, on whoſe nature / Nurture can neuer ſticke :"
- "[…]a man neither by nature nor by nurture wiſe."
- "The problem is aggravated by the fact that much of the gay sub-culture is not conducive to the nurture of the radical ego integrity of which Erikson speaks."
- "Look where he would, some heap of ruins afforded him rich promise of a working off; the whole town appeared to have been ploughed, and sown, and nurtured by most genial weather; and a goodly harvest was at hand."
- "2009, UNESCO, The United Nations World Water Development Report – N° 3 - 2009 – Freshwater and International Law (the Interplay between Universal, Regional and Basin Perspectives), page 10, →ISBN The relationships between universal norms and specific norms nurture the development of international law."
Etymology
From Middle English norture, noriture, from Old French norriture, norreture, from Late Latin nutritura (“nourishment”), from Latin nutrire (“to nourish”).