apprehension

Thesaurus: synonyms, antonyms, and examples

fear
fearI have a dreadful fear of heights.
terrorShe fled from the attacker in terror.
dreadThe thought of giving a speech filled me with dread.
alarmI don't want to cause you any alarm, but there's a rattlesnake in the path ahead of you.
frightThe family ran from their home in fright when the earthquake struck.
panicPanic spread through the crowd when someone shouted "Fire!"
 live in dread of something/doing something(alsolive in dread that)
to be worried that something will happen that you really do not want to happen:
I live in dread of bumping into her in the street.我每天都害怕在街上碰见她。
His team has the power to instil dread in their opponents.
They had a superstitious dread of this new technology.
I was engulfed by a dread of what might happen.

SMART Vocabulary: related words and phrases

Anxious and worried
(all) hot and botheredidiom
aflutter
agitated
angsty
anxious
fretfully
frightened
fuss
get in a sweatidiom
goosey
pit of your stomachidiom
preoccupied
prey
prey on sb's mindidiom
prey on something
wired
worried
worriedly
worrier
worrywart

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Fear & phobias

dreadnoun (HAIR)

 dreads[ plural ]informal
short fordreadlocks: a hairstyle in which the hair hangs in long, thick, twisted pieces:
They wore their hair in dreads.
dread
adjective[ before noun ]
 formaluk /dred/ us /dred/
causing fear or worry: 令人畏惧的，令人担忧的
The dread spectre of civil war looms over the country.
Every business person fears the dread moment when the laptop fails as they stand up to give a presentation.
humorous
used to refer to something that you do not like or want: 讨厌的，令人厌烦的
Conversation returned to that dread word, fashion.
He developed a virus to battle the dread disease polio.
When the dread news finally came, staff began to weep.
At least nobody uttered the dread words: "Do you know who I am?"
It would be waved aside by that dread phrase, "political correctness".

SMART Vocabulary: related words and phrases

Describing things that cause fear
awesome
awesomely
awesomeness
bloodcurdling
chilling
fearsome
fearsomely
frightening
frighteningly
greasily
imposingly
intimidating
intimidatingly
scarifying
scarifyingly
spookily
spooky
terrifying
terrifyingly
traumatic

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Inspiring dislike

dread | American Dictionary

dread
noun[ U ]
us/dred/
extreme fear or anxiety about something that is going to happen or might happen:
a dread of drowning

dread

verb[ T ]us/dred/
We dreaded hearing the results of the blood tests.

Examples of dread

dread
We dreaded poliomyelitis and similar devastating acute, rapidly fatal illnesses.
Mathematics may be dreaded by many, but it also makes creative use of language, producing terms with surprising and fascinating origins.
In a strong, even pace, we skirted the hillside ancient hunters dreaded, headed south, and crossed the two railroad tracks.
His father had always dreaded leaving family and home, enduring the vagaries of weather and transport together with fatiguing and often unpleasant legal business.
Pierre can accept pointless suffering through having secured an independence of the world and an awareness of absolute safety in which nothing is dreaded.
In particular, there is a wish to respond positively in situations where patients are critically ill, have distressing symptoms, or have a dreaded diagnosis.
The associated psychological tensions make it a prospect to be dreaded and fought against if we can.
The displayer merely acts, perhaps without awareness that others might take the act as example, perhaps knowing and dreading their doing so.
When he awakes he is re-born, and 'the earth he had dreaded' seemed clearer and beautiful.
Elders complained unceasingly about these trends, and dreaded the possibility of their daughters eloping.
If reformism is not a disembedded universal, nor is it endowed with the unfettered agency so evidently dreaded by its many critical commentators.
The issue may be crudely defined in (dreaded) binary terms.
Mental health problems were 'no longer dreaded' as they had been before.
Because he's rough, and everyone dreads him.
Anyone who dreaded the emergence of a centralised, almighty 'superstate' should be more than reassured.
From Europarl Parallel Corpus - English
See all examples of dread
These examples are from corpora and from sources on the web. Any opinions in the examples do not represent the opinion of the Cambridge Dictionary editors or of Cambridge University Press or its licensors.