INSTINCT

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does instinct mean? 

• INSTINCT (noun)
  The noun INSTINCT has 1 sense:

1. inborn pattern of behavior often responsive to specific stimuli

  Familiarity information: INSTINCT used as a noun is very rare.

• INSTINCT (adjective)
  The adjective INSTINCT has 1 sense:

1. (followed by 'with') deeply filled or permeated

  Familiarity information: INSTINCT used as an adjective is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• INSTINCT (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Inborn pattern of behavior often responsive to specific stimuli

Classified under:

Nouns denoting cognitive processes and contents

Synonyms:

inherent aptitude; instinct

Context example:

altruistic instincts in social animals

Hypernyms ("instinct" is a kind of...):

aptitude (inherent ability)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "instinct"):

id ((psychoanalysis) primitive instincts and energies underlying all psychic activity)

• INSTINCT (adjective)

Sense 1

Meaning:

(followed by 'with') deeply filled or permeated

Synonyms:

instinct; replete

Context example:

it is replete with misery

Similar:

full (containing as much or as many as is possible or normal)

 Context examples 

I felt myself struggling to awake to some call of my instincts; nay, my very soul was struggling, and my half-remembered sensibilities were striving to answer the call.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

His thoughts and beauties are so spread abroad that one touches them everywhere; one is intimate with him by instinct.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

And not only did he learn by experience, but instincts long dead became alive again.

(The Call of the Wild, by Jack London)

Unpossessed of conscience or moral instinct, you might have mastered the world, broken it to your hand.

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)

“I came straight to it, by instinct, I suppose.”

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

For him to attack her would require nothing less than a violation of his instinct.

(White Fang, by Jack London)

When a woman thinks that her house is on fire, her instinct is at once to rush to the thing which she values most.

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

“You will rise high in your profession. You have instinct and intuition,” said he.

(His Last Bow, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

With Jekyll, it was a thing of vital instinct.

(The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

Mine I had snatched from my knees and held over my head, by a sort of instinct.

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)