behavior

English Online Dictionary. What means behavior‎? What does behavior mean?

English

Alternative forms

• behaviour (UK)
• behavoure, behavier, behavor, behavour (all obsolete)

Etymology

From Middle English behavoure, behaver, from behaven (modern behave), with the ending apparently in imitation of havour (see 'havior), a corruption of Old French aveir and/or avoir (“a having”), ultimately from Latin habēre. Compare Scots havings (“behavior”), from have (“to behave”). Displaced Old English ġebǣru.

Pronunciation

• (General American) IPA^(key): /bɪˈheɪvjɚ/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /bɪˈheɪvjə/
• Rhymes: -eɪvjə(ɹ)
• Hyphenation: be‧ha‧vior

Noun

behavior (usually uncountable, plural behaviors) (American spelling)

1. (uncountable) Human conduct relative to social norms.
2. (countable, uncountable) The way a living creature behaves or acts generally.
3. (uncountable, informal) A state of probation about one's conduct.

4. (countable, uncountable, biology, psychology) Observable response produced by an organism.
5. (uncountable) The way a device or system operates.

Synonyms

Derived terms

Related terms

• behave

Collocations

Translations

Further reading

• "behavior" in Raymond Williams, Keywords (revised), 1983, Fontana Press, page 43.
• “behavior”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “behavior”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.