Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
Definition: Indecision |
IndecisionNoun1. Doubt concerning two or more possible alternatives or courses of action; "his indecision was only momentary but the opportunity was lost". 2. The trait of irresolution; a lack of firmness of character or purpose; "the king's incurable indecisiveness caused turmoil in his court". Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "indecision" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1791. (references) |
| Domain | Definition |
Satire | INDECISION, n. The chief element of success; "for whereas," saith Sir Thomas Brewbold, "there is but one way to do nothing and divers way to do something, whereof, to a surety, only one is the right way, it followeth that he who from indecision standeth still hath not so many chances of going astray as he who pusheth forwards" -- a most clear and satisfactory exposition on the matter. "Your prompt decision to attack," said Genera Grant on a certain occasion to General Gordon Granger, "was admirable; you had but five minutes to make up your mind in." "Yes, sir," answered the victorious subordinate, "it is a great thing to be know exactly what to do in an emergency. When in doubt whether to attack or retreat I never hesitate a moment -- I toss us a copper." "Do you mean to say that's what you did this time?" "Yes, General; but for Heaven's sake don't reprimand me: I disobeyed the coin.". Source: Devil's Dictionary. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
Synonyms: IndecisionSynonyms: indecisiveness (n), irresolution (n). (additional references) |
| Antonym: decisiveness (n). (additional references) |
| Context | Synonyms within Context (source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus). |
Absence of Choice | Neutrality, indifference; indecision; (irresolution); arbitrariness. |
Irresolution | Noun: irresolution, infirmity of purpose, indecision; indetermination, undetermination; unsettlement; uncertainty; demur, suspense; hesitating; Verb:, hesitation, hesitancy; vacillation; changeableness; fluctuation; alternation; (oscillation); caprice. |
| Source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus. | |
Crosswords: Indecision |
| English words defined with "indecision": hesitation ♦ indecisiveness, irresolution ♦ on the fence, Out of doubt ♦ undecided ♦ vacillation ♦ wavering. (references) |
| Specialty definitions using "indecision": Yield. (references) |
| Domain | Usage | |
Screenplays | A wrong decision is better than indecision. (The Sopranos; writing credit: Isabel Clara-Simo; Ramón De España) Indecision is a virus that can run through an army and destroy it's will to win. Or even to survive (In Harm's Way; writing credit: James Bassett; Wendell Mayes) | |
Lyrics | Damned indecision and cursed pride (She's Out of My Life; performing artist: Michael Jackson) I can't stand this indecision (Everybody Wants To Rule The World; performing artist: Tears For Fears) | |
Movie/TV Titles | ||
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | ||
| Domain | Title |
Books |
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Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Thumbnail | Description & Credit |  | "Indecision". Credit: Library of Congress. |
Source: pictures compiled by the editor from various references; see picture credits. | |||
| Play | Caption |
 | Suspense; anxiety; apprehension; chiller; cliff-hanger; expectancy; expectation; grabber; hesitancy; hesitation; impatience; indecision; indecisiveness; insecurity; irresolution; page-turner; perplexity; potboiler; tension; thriller; uncertainty; tense; i. |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Author | Quotation |
George Canning | Indecision and delays are the parents of failure. |
Maimonides | The risk of a wrong decision is preferable to the terror of indecision. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | |
| Title | Author | Quote |
Les Miserables | Hugo, Victor | The only thing which was plain from his attitude and his countenance was a strange indecision. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
| Subject | Topic | Quote |
Economic History | Romania | Large deals involving the government of Romania frequently become stymied by vested political and economic interests and bogged down by indecision within governmental ministries. (references) |
Source: compiled by the editor from ICON Group International, Inc.; see credits. | ||
| "Indecision" is generally used as a noun (singular) -- approximately 99.35% of the time. "Indecision" is used about 155 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted) |
| Parts of Speech | Percent | Usage per 100 Million Words | Rank in English |
| Noun (singular) | 99.35% | 154 | 25,326 |
| Noun (common) | 0.65% | 1 | 339,140 |
| Total | 100.00% | 155 | N/A |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
Expressions using "indecision": actual zone of indecision ♦ maximum standard zone of indecision ♦ nominal zone of indecision ♦ standard zone of indecision ♦ zone of indecision. Additional references. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. |
| The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com. |
| Expression | Frequency per Day |
indecision | 32 |
indecision record | 17 |
indecision without | 3 |
career indecision | 2 |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Language | Translations for "indecision"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | |
Albanian | pavendosmëri (hesitance, hesitancy, hesitation, irresolution, vacillation). (various references) | |
Arabic | حيرة (bewilderment, confusion, discomfiture, disconcertion, dismay, distraction, embarrassment, hesitance, hesitancy, irresolution, maze, mystification, nonplus, perplexedly, perplexity, puzzle, puzzlement, tangle), تردد (ambivalence, backwards, balance, be in two minds, boggle, crane, demur, difficulty, dither, fainting, falter, flicker, float, fluctuate, fluctuation, hang, haunt, hesitance, hesitancy, hesitate, hesitation, hover, hum and haw, irresolution, pause, perplexity, puzzle over, reticence, reverberate, scruple, shilly shally, sound, stick, stop, stumble, tergiversation, timidity, vacillate, vacillation, vibrate, vibration, waver, wobble, worry). (various references) | |
Bulgarian | колебание (demur, dubiety, falter, faltering, fluctuation, hesitance, hesitancy, hesitation, hovel, oscillation, qualm, quandary, scruple, vacillation, variation, wabble, wavering, wobble), нерешителност (diffidence, hesitation, irresolution, shilly shally, wavering). (various references) | |
Chinese | 犹豫不决 (indecisive, irresolute). (various references) | |
Czech | váhavost (hesitance, hesitancy, hesitation, irresolution), nerozhodnost (hesitation, irresolution). (various references) | |
Danish | uskarpt omraade (indecision range), US (standard zone of indecision, United States, United States of America), UN (nominal zone of indecision, undulatus), ubestemthedsomraade (zone of indecision), Ua (actual zone of indecision, Ukraine), standardubestemthedsomraade (standard zone of indecision), nominelt ubestemhedsomraade (nominal zone of indecision), maksimalt standardubestemthesomraade (maximum standard zone of indecision), fastisk ubestemthedsomraade (actual zone of indecision). (various references) | |
Dutch | wankelmoedigheid (infirmity of purpose, irresolution), besluiteloosheid (infirmity of purpose, irresolution). (various references) | |
Esperanto | ŝanceliĝemo (infirmity of purpose, irresolution). (various references) | |
Farsi | تامل , تردید (Doubt, Hang, Hesitancy, Qualm, Query, Scruple, Skepticism, Suspicion, Uncertainty, Vibration), دودلی (Doubt, Hesitancy), بی تصƒمیمی , بی عزمی . (various references) | |
Finnish | horjuvuus (unsteadiness, vacillation), epäröiminen (hesitancy, hesitation, indetermination, wavering). (various references) | |
French | irrésolution, indécision (indecisiveness), vacillement. (various references) | |
German | unschlüssigkeit (hesitance, hesitancy, hesitation, irresoluteness, irresolution, vacillation), Zögern (demur, dilatoriness, falter, hang back, hesitance, hesitancy, hesitate, hesitation, hold back, indecisions, lag, pause, procrastinate, procrastination, Tarry, to demur, to hesitate, to pause, waver), Unentschiedenheit (abeyance, irresoluteness, irresolution). (various references) | |
Greek | αναποφάσιστο (irresoluteness, irresolution), δισταγμόσ (demur, hesitance, hesitancy, hesitation, qualm, scruple). (various references) | |
Hebrew | הססנות (hesitance, hesitancy, timidity). (various references) | |
Hungarian | határozatlanság (debility of purpose, hesitation, incertitude, infirmity, irresolution, shilly shally, shilly-shally, wobbliness). (various references) | |
Indonesian | ah (ah, alas, exclamation of indecision, yech). (various references) | |
Italian | indecisione (incertitude), incertezza (doubt, incertitude, quandary, suspense, uncertainty, unstableness, unsteadiness, unsureness, wobbliness). (various references) | |
Japanese Kanji | 躊躇 (hesitation), 迷い (bewilderment, Buddhism maya, doubt, hesitation, infatuation), 狐疑 , 付かず離れず , 因循 (vacillation), 不決断 (irresolution, vacillation). (various references) | |
Japanese Katakana | まよい (bewilderment, Buddhism maya, doubt, hesitation, infatuation), ふけつだん (irresolution, vacillation), つかずはなれず, いんじゅん (vacillation), こぎ (ancient rites, last year, old interpretation, old meaning), ちゅうちょ (hesitation). (various references) | |
Norwegian | ubesluttsomhet. (various references) | |
Pig Latin | indecisionay.(various references) | |
Portuguese | indeciso (hesitation), hesitao (hesitance, hesitancy, hesitation). (various references) | |
Romanian | nesiguranţã (doubt, dubiety, hesitation, incertitude, insecurity, precariousness, uncertainty), nehotãrâre (hesitation, irresolution), ezitare (demur, hesitance, hesitancy, hesitation, hover, pause, poise, stagger, stumble, vacillation, wavering, wobble), şovãialã (hesitation, indetermination, pause, shilly shally, ticklishness, vacillation, wavering). (various references) | |
Russian | нерешительность (backing and filling, hesitancy, hesitation, irresolution, shilly shally, wavering). (various references) | |
Serbo-Croatian | neodlučnost (hesitance, hesitancy, irresolution, shakiness, shilly shally). (various references) | |
Spanish | indecisión (hesitance, hesitancy, hesitation). (various references) | |
Swedish | tvekan (dubiety, dubitation, hesitance, hesitancy, hesitation, pause, shilly shally, uncertainty, vacillation), obeslutsamhet (irresolution). (various references) | |
Thai | ความไม่แน่ใจ. (various references) | |
Turkish | tereddüd (demur, doubt, fluctuation, hesitance, hesitancy, hesitation, incertitude, indeterminate, irresolution, oscillation, pause, perplexity, puzzle, quandary, shilly shally, suspense, uncertainty, vacillation, vibration, wobble), kararsızlık (changeability, dither, doubt, doubtfulness, dubiousness, fickleness, flightiness, fluctuation, haziness, hesitance, hesitancy, incertitude, inconsistency, indeterminate, infirmity, infirmity of purpose, instability, irresolution, looseness, oscillation, quandary, shilly shally, suspense, uncertainty, unsteadiness, vacillation, variability). (various references) | |
Ukrainian | нерішучість (backwardness, doubtfulness, embarrassment, fluctuation, hesitance, hesitancy, hesitation, irresolution, pause, shilly shally, weakness). (various references) | |
Vietnamese | sự thiếu quả quyết, sự do dự (demur, dubitation, irresolution, oscillation, shilly-shally). (various references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various translation references. | ||
| Language | Period | Translations |
| Latin | 500 BCE-Modern | inconstabilitio. (various references) |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
Derivations | |
Words beginning with "indecision": indecisions. (additional references) | |
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"Indecision" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: cinecasino, indecission, intercision. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
| # of Phoneme Matches | Pronunciation | Word(s) rhyming with "indecision" (pronounced i'ndusi"zhun) |
| 7 | -d u s i" zh u n | decision. |
| 6 | -u s i" zh u n | recision, rescission. |
| 5 | -s i" zh u n | circumcision, excision, incision, precision. |
| 4 | -i" zh u n | collision, derision, division, envision, misprision, provision, revision, supervision, vision. |
| 3 | -zh u n | abrasion, allusion, aspersion, aversion, cohesion, collusion, conclusion, confusion, contusion, conversion, corrosion, delusion, diffusion, disillusion, dispersion, diversion, equation, erosion, evasion, exclusion, excursion, explosion, extrusion, fusion, illusion, immersion, implosion, inclusion, incursion, infusion, intrusion, invasion, inversion, lesion, occasion, occlusion, persuasion, perversion, preclusion, profusion, reversion, seclusion, suasion, subdivision, submersion, subversion, television, transfusion, version. |
Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits. | ||
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
| Words within the letters "c-d-e-i-i-i-n-n-o-s" | |
-2 letters: coniines, decision, idiocies, incision, oscinine. | |
-3 letters: codeins, coniine, conines, eosinic, incised, indices, iodines, ionised, secondi. | |
-4 letters: codein, codens, coined, conies, conine, conins, conned, cosied, cosine, donsie, icones, incise, indies, inions, inside, iodine, iodins, iodise, ionics, ionise, noised, nonces, onside, oscine, second, sinned. | |
-5 letters: cedis, cines, cions, coden, codes, coeds, coins, coned, cones, conin, conns. | |
| Words containing the letters "c-d-e-i-i-i-n-n-o-s" | |
+1 letter: decisioning, indecisions. | |
+2 letters: disinfection, enchiridions, indirections, indiscretion. | |
+3 letters: densification, disinfections, indiscretions, interdictions, nicotinamides. | |
+4 letters: densifications, nondistinctive, quindecillions. | |
+5 letters: decommissioning, denazifications, discontinuities, identifications, inconsideration, injudiciousness, noninsecticidal. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro. | |
| 1. Definition 2. Synonyms 3. Crosswords 4. Usage: Modern | 5. Usage: Commercial 6. Images: Photo Album 7. Sounds 8. Quotations: Familiar | 9. Quotations: Fiction 10. Quotations: Non-fiction 11. Usage Frequency 12. Expressions | 13. Expressions: Internet 14. Translations: Modern 15. Translations: Ancient 16. Derivations | 17. Rhymes 18. Anagrams 19. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
