ingenuous

Word family

• ingenuously
  adverbC2
• ingenuousness
  nounC2

Synonym discussion

Sense: adjective/1

Ingenuous, naive, candid, innocent, and guileless all suggest a lack of calculation, but they are not the same. Naive mainly points to inexperience and often sounds more critical. Candid focuses on speaking openly, even when the speaker is not especially trusting. Innocent can describe moral blamelessness or simple lack of experience, so it is wider than ingenuous. Guileless is more literary and highlights the absence of trickery. Ingenuous combines frankness with a readiness to believe other people, often making someone seem warm but unprotected. A candid manager may speak plainly; an ingenuous child may trust a stranger too quickly. An innocent witness may simply know nothing, while an ingenuous one speaks openly and assumes others mean well.

Common collocations

Etymology

Ingenuous came into English from Latin ingenuus, a word that first meant 'free-born' and later developed the sense of being frank and open. English kept the idea of someone whose honest, unguarded nature shows little suspicion of other people. Because ingenuous looks similar to ingenious, learners often mix them up, but ingenuous is about character and openness, not clever invention.