confuse

«confuse» in Mova's school dictionary: to make them unable to understand or think clearly: «The… — its meaning for a pupil, its sense in the lessons and examples, with 5 sentences of Mova's corpora that use it.

part of speech

verb (confuse, confuses, confused, confusing)

meaning for a pupil

1) To confuse someone is to make them unable to understand or think clearly: «The instructions confused me.» tree →

2) To confuse two things is to mix them up and think one is the other: «I always confuse the twins.» tree →

3) To confuse a situation is to make it more complicated or unclear. tree →

sense in the lessons

In school, some words are easily confused (their/there/they're; affect/effect), and maths symbols can be confused (× and +, < and >). In stories, a mysterious clue confuses the detective. In safety lessons, scammers try to confuse people with tricky messages. Phrases: «confuse A with B», «get confused», «confusing instructions».

examples

• The long question confused me. tree →
• I always confuse «there» and «their». tree →
• Don't confuse a centipede with a millipede. tree →
• The new road signs confused the drivers. tree →
• People often confuse the twins. tree →
• The magician confused the audience with his trick. tree →
• I got confused and went to the wrong classroom. tree →
• If you are confused, ask the teacher to explain again. tree →
• ‘You confuse the names, Sire,’ said the page hastily. ‘I come on behalf of the Princess Turritella.’ tree →

note

Past: confused. Adjectives: confused (how you feel: «I am confused»), confusing (what causes it: «the map is confusing»). Noun: confusion. Pattern: «confuse A with B». Asking questions when confused is a smart thing to do.

In the corpora

• Voice assistants turn sounds into words and then guess what you meant; accents and background noise can confuse them.
• Stripes might also confuse a lion trying to pick out one zebra from a running herd, but this is less certain.
• Some deep-sea shrimp squirt a glowing cloud to confuse a hunter, a little like squid ink but made of light.
• Bright beach lights confuse turtle hatchlings, which crawl towards the lights instead of the moonlit sea.
• Bright lights at night confuse moths and migrating birds, and baby sea turtles crawl towards lights instead of towards the sea.

Trees and pragmatics

Every meaning and example of «confuse» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.