different between adolescent vs puerile

English

Etymology

First attested 1482, from French adolescent, from Latin adolescentem, accusative form of adolescens, present participle of adol?scere (“to become adult, grow up”), from ad- (“to”) + al?scere (“to grow or become nourished”). The adjective first appeared in 1785.

Pronunciation

• enPR: ?d'?l?s??nt, IPA^(key): /?æd??l?s?nt/

Adjective

adolescent (comparative more adolescent, superlative most adolescent)

1. Of, relating to, or at the age of adolescence; at the stage between being a child and an adult
   • 1785, William Cowper, Tirocinium

     Schools, unless discipline were doubly strong, / Detain their adolescent charge too long.

Derived terms

• preadolescent

Related terms

• adolescence
• adult

Translations

Noun

adolescent (plural adolescents)

1. A person who is in adolescence; someone who has reached puberty but is not yet an adult.

Translations

Further reading

• adolescent at OneLook Dictionary Search
• adolescent in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• adolescent in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.
• WHO Guidelines on the Pharmacological Treatment of Persisting Pain in Children with Medical Illnesses, (2012) , World Health Organization

Catalan

Etymology

From Latin adul?sc?ns.

Pronunciation

• (Balearic) IPA^(key): /?.do.l??sent/
• (Central) IPA^(key): /?.du.l??sen/
• (Valencian) IPA^(key): /a.do.le?sent/

Adjective

adolescent (masculine and feminine plural adolescents)

1. adolescent

Noun

adolescent m or f (plural adolescents)

1. teenager

Related terms

• adolescència

Further reading

• “adolescent” in Diccionari de la llengua catalana, segona edició, Institut d’Estudis Catalans.

Czech

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): [?adol?st?s?nt]
• Hyphenation: ado?les?cent

Noun

adolescent m anim (feminine adolescentka)

1. adolescent

   Synonyms: dospívající, puber?ák

Declension

Related terms

Further reading

• adolescent in Kartotéka Novo?eského lexikálního archivu

Dutch

Etymology

Borrowed from French adolescent, from Latin adol?sc?ns.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?a?.do?.l??s?nt/
• Hyphenation: ado?les?cent
• Rhymes: -?nt

Noun

adolescent m or f (plural adolescenten, diminutive adolescentje n)

1. adolescent

Synonyms

• jongere

Derived terms

• adolescentie

French

Etymology

From Latin adolesco

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /a.d?.l?.s??/

Adjective

adolescent (feminine singular adolescente, masculine plural adolescents, feminine plural adolescentes)

1. adolescent
   • 1866, Eugène Sue, L'alouette du casque

     Au retour de Victoria, si belle de sa beauté de quinze ans, j’avais son âge ; je devins, quoique à peine adolescent, follement épris d’elle ; je cachai soigneusement cet amour, autant par timidité que par suite du respect que m’inspirait, malgré le fraternel attachement dont elle me donnait chaque jour des preuves, cette sérieuse jeune fille, qui rapportait du collège des druidesses je ne sais quoi d’imposant, de pensif et de mystérieux.

     When Victoria returned in her dazzling beauty of fifteen years I was of the same age and although hardly of the age of puberty myself, I fell distractedly in love with her. I carefully concealed my feelings, out of friendship as well as by reason of the respect that, despite the fraternal attachment of which she every day gave me fresh proof, that serious young maid, who brought with her from the college of the female druids an indescribably imposing, pensive and mysterious appearance, inspired in me.

Noun

adolescent m (plural adolescents, feminine adolescente)

1. adolescent
   • 1841, François-René de Chateaubriand, Mémoires d'outre-tombe

     Je me mis à tirer l'horoscope de l'adolescente vendangeuse : vieillira-t-elle au pressoir, mère de famille obscure et heureuse ? Sera-t-elle emmenée les camps par un caporal ? Deviendra-t-elle la proie de quelque Don Juan ? La villageoise enlevée aime son ravisseur autant d'étonnement que d'amour ; il la transporte dans un palais de marbre sur le détroit de Messine, sous un palmier au bord d'une source, en face de la mer qui déploie ses flots d'azur, et de l'Etna qui jette des flammes.

     I set to drawing up the horoscope of the adolescent fruit-picker: will she grow old at the cider-press, the mother of an obscure but happy family? Will she be led off to the camps by some corporal? Will she fall prey to some Don Juan? The seduced village girl loves her ravisher as well as the astonishment of love; he transports her to a palace of marble on the Straits of Messina, beneath a palm-tree beside a fountain, facing the sea with azure wave, and Etna spouting flame.

Related terms

• adolescence

Further reading

• “adolescent” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Latin

Verb

adol?scent

1. third-person plural future active indicative of adol?sc?

Romanian

Etymology

From French adolescent

Noun

adolescent m (plural adolescen?i)

1. teenager

Declension

English

Etymology

From Latin puer?lis (“childish”), from puer (“child, boy”).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?pj??.?a?l/
• (US) IPA^(key): /?pj???l/, /?pj??a?l/

Adjective

puerile (comparative more puerile, superlative most puerile)

1. Childish; trifling; silly.

   Synonyms: juvenile, silly, trifling; see also Thesaurus:childish, Thesaurus:insignificant

   • 1850, Thomas De Quincey, French and English Manners (originally published in Hogg's Instructor

     The French have been notorious through generations for their puerile affectation of Roman forms, models, and historic precedents.

   • 1927, Thornton Wilder, The Bridge of San Luis Rey, page 79:

     From the table he had received the gout; from the alcove a tendency to convulsions; from the grandeeship a pride so vast and puerile that he seldom heard anything that was said to him and talked to the ceiling in a perpetual monologue; from the exile, oceans of boredom, a boredom so persuasive that it was like pain,—he woke up with it and spent the day with it, and it sat by his bed all night watching his sleep.

   • 1930 July, West Kirby, Last and First Men by Olaf Stapledon, Preface (page 9 of the Dover 1968 reprint of L&FM and Star Maker):

     Today we should welcome, and even study, every serious attempt to envisage the future of our race, not merely to grasp the very diverse and often tragic possibilities that confront us, but also that we may familiarize ourselves with the certainty that many of our cherished ideals would seem puerile to more developed minds.

2. Characteristic of, or pertaining to, a boy or boys; compare puellile. (Can we add an example for this sense?)

Derived terms

• puerilism
• puerility

Translations

See also

• boyish
• yobbish
• youthful

Anagrams

• pie rule

German

Pronunciation

Adjective

puerile

1. inflection of pueril:
   1. strong/mixed nominative/accusative feminine singular
   2. strong nominative/accusative plural
   3. weak nominative all-gender singular
   4. weak accusative feminine/neuter singular

Italian

Etymology

From Latin puer?lis.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /pwe?ri.le/

Adjective

puerile (plural puerili)

1. puerile, childish, juvenile, boyish
2. (rare, relational) children's, baby

Synonyms

• infantile

Related terms

Anagrams

• pelurie

Latin

Pronunciation

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /pu.e?ri?.le/, [pu???i????]
• (Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /pu.e?ri.le/, [pu???i?l?]

Adjective

puer?le

1. nominative neuter singular of puer?lis
2. accusative neuter singular of puer?lis
3. vocative neuter singular of puer?lis

References

• puerile in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition, 1883–1887)