SHYNESS

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does shyness mean? 

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

1. a feeling of fear of embarrassment

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

 Dictionary entry details 

• SHYNESS (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A feeling of fear of embarrassment

Classified under:

Nouns denoting feelings and emotions

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

timidity; timidness; timorousness (fear of the unknown or unfamiliar or fear of making decisions)

Derivation:

shy (lacking self-confidence)

 Context examples 

The excellence of his understanding and his principles can be concealed only by that shyness which too often keeps him silent.

(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)

I felt no fear of him, and but little shyness.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

There must be a sort of shyness; but I cannot recollect that our evenings formerly were ever merry, except when my uncle was in town.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

I noticed the anxious light in Johnson’s eyes, but mistook it for the native shyness and embarrassment of the man.

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)

He was more at ease than that first night at dinner, nearly a year before, and his shyness and modesty even commended him to Mrs. Morse, who was pleased at his manifest improvement.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

These might include: • Intelligence problems, ranging from learning disabilities to severe intellectual disabilities • Social and emotional problems, such as aggression in boys or shyness in girls • Speech and language problems, especially in boys

(Fragile X Syndrome, NIH: National Institute of Child Health and Human Development)

There are many men in London, you know, who, some from shyness, some from misanthropy, have no wish for the company of their fellows.

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

But there was no shyness or shiftiness about Berks’s fighting.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Laurie sat bold upright, and meekly took her empty plate feeling an odd sort of pleasure in having 'little Amy' order him about, for she had lost her shyness now, and felt an irrestible desire to trample on him, as girls have a delightful way of doing when lords of creation show any signs of subjection.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

Georgiana's reception of them was very civil, but attended with all the embarrassment which, though proceeding from shyness and the fear of doing wrong, would easily give to those who felt themselves inferior the belief of her being proud and reserved.

(Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen)