WAVERING

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does wavering mean? 

• WAVERING (noun)
  The noun WAVERING has 2 senses:

1. indecision in speech or action

2. the quality of being unsteady and subject to changes

  Familiarity information: WAVERING used as a noun is rare.

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

1. uncertain in purpose or action

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

 Dictionary entry details 

• WAVERING (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Indecision in speech or action

Classified under:

Nouns denoting cognitive processes and contents

Synonyms:

hesitation; vacillation; wavering

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

indecision; indecisiveness; irresolution (doubt concerning two or more possible alternatives or courses of action)

Derivation:

waver (pause or hold back in uncertainty or unwillingness)

Sense 2

Meaning:

The quality of being unsteady and subject to changes

Classified under:

Nouns denoting attributes of people and objects

Synonyms:

fluctuation; wavering

Context example:

he kept a record of price fluctuations

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

irregularity; unregularity (not characterized by a fixed principle or rate; at irregular intervals)

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

scintillation (the twinkling of the stars caused when changes in the density of the earth's atmosphere produce uneven refraction of starlight)

Derivation:

waver (move or sway in a rising and falling or wavelike pattern)

• WAVERING (adjective)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Uncertain in purpose or action

Synonyms:

vacillant; vacillating; wavering

Similar:

irresolute (uncertain how to act or proceed)

 Context examples 

An instant later a white-faced, hard-breathing policeman had opened the door, the candle wavering in his trembling hand.

(His Last Bow, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Yet do not suppose, because I complain a little or because I can conceive a consolation for my toils which I may never know, that I am wavering in my resolutions.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

There is not a shadow of wavering.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

While you were in the smallest degree wavering, I said nothing about it, because I would not influence; but it would have been the loss of a friend to me.

(Emma, by Jane Austen)

Easier the other way, perhaps; and yet, had I the nerve to lie and look up at that deadly black shadow wavering down upon me?

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

He went in with a sounding plunge; the red cap came off and remained floating on the surface; and as soon as the splash subsided, I could see him and Israel lying side by side, both wavering with the tremulous movement of the water.

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

Catherine cheerfully complied, and being properly equipped, was more impatient than ever to be at the pump-room, that she might inform herself of General Tilney's lodgings, for though she believed they were in Milsom Street, she was not certain of the house, and Mrs. Allen's wavering convictions only made it more doubtful.

(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)

If Jo had only known what a great happiness was wavering in the balance for one of them, she would have turned dove-like in a minute, but unfortunately, we don't have windows in our breasts, and cannot see what goes on in the minds of our friends.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

I had a vague sensation of being, as it were, on view, when the maid opened it; and of wavering, somehow, across a hall with a weather-glass in it, into a quiet little drawing-room on the ground-floor, commanding a neat garden.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

If he had been wavering before as to what he should do, which had often seemed likely, the advice and entreaty of so near a relation might settle every doubt, and determine him at once to be as happy as dignity unblemished could make him.

(Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen)