Synonyms for skittish
ˈskɪt ɪʃskit·tish

WiktionaryRate these synonyms:0.0 / 0 votes

1. skittishadjective

   Synonyms:
   spookish, squirrelly, jumpy

2. skittishadjective

   Easily scared or startled; timid.

   The cat likes people he knows, but he is skittish around strangers.

   Synonyms:
   squirrelly, spookish, jumpy

3. skittishadjective

   wanton; changeable; fickle

   Skittish Fortune's hall. Shakespeare.

   Synonyms:
   squirrelly, jumpy, spookish

English Synonyms and AntonymsRate these synonyms:0.0 / 0 votes

1. skittish

   Balky, mulish, obstinate, and stubborn are synonyms of restive only in an infrequent if not obsolete use; the supposed sense of "tending to rest," "standing stubbornly still," is scarcely supported by any examples, and those cited to support that meaning often fail to do so. The disposition to offer active resistance to control by any means whatever is what is commonly indicated by restive in the best English speech and literature. Dryden speaks of "the pampered colt" as "restiff to the rein;" but the rein is not used to propel a horse forward, but to hold him in, and it is against this that he is "restiff." A horse may be made restless by flies or by martial music, but with no refractoriness; the restive animal impatiently resists or struggles to break from control, as by bolting, flinging his rider, or otherwise. With this the metaphorical use of the word agrees, which is always in the sense of such terms as impatient, intractable, rebellious, and the like; a people restive under despotism are not disposed to "rest" under it, but to resist it and fling it off.

   Synonyms:
   balky, fidgety, fractious, fretful, frisky, impatient, intractable, mulish, mutinous, obstinate, rebellious, recalcitrant, refractory, resentful, restiff, restive, restless, stubborn, unruly, vicious

   Antonyms:
   docile, gentle, manageable, obedient, passive, peaceable, quiet, submissive, tractable, yielding

Princeton's WordNetRate these synonyms:0.0 / 0 votes

1. skittish, flighty, spooky, nervousadjective

   unpredictably excitable (especially of horses)

   Synonyms:
   flyaway, queasy, aflutter, flighty, uneasy, nervous, unquiet, neural, head-in-the-clouds, spooky, scatterbrained, anxious

   Antonyms:
   unexcitable

Dictionary of English SynonymesRate these synonyms:0.0 / 0 votes

1. skittishadjective

   Synonyms:
   shy (as a horse), timid, timorous, easily frightened

Synonyms, Antonyms & Associated WordsRate these synonyms:0.0 / 0 votes

1. skittishadjective

   Synonyms:
   timorous, shy, volatile, restless, wanton

PPDB, the paraphrase databaseRate these paraphrases:0.0 / 0 votes

1. List of paraphrases for "skittish":

   temperamental, capricious, whimsical, spoilt, nervous, cranky

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How to use skittish in a sentence?

1. Ben Cook:

   The market gets skittish. If Libya were to go out, oil prices could easily spike $ 5 to $ 10 from current levels.

2. Julianne Smith:

   For Americans the answer seems obvious, we simply have to try and do it all and be prepared for multiple scenarios. But for small countries that have very limited funding and a public that's a little skittish right now, it's a much tougher question to answer.

3. Gary Bradshaw:

   There's a lot of people that doubt the market and they're still skittish and don't believe the rally or think they ought to be in bonds.

4. Elvis Picardo:

   It's an environment right now where investors are skittish and they're not going to hesitate to take profits on stocks that have moved higher.

5. Arun Bharath:

   Investors are being a little bit skittish and taking some profits, there are clearly some concerns that what is happening outside of the U.S. may impact the U.S. at some point.