habituated 1 of 2

Definition of habituatednext
as in accustomed
being in the habit or custom not only did the early-morning anchorman become habituated to getting up early, he found he actually liked it

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habituated

2 of 2

verb

past tense of habituate

Example Sentences

Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
Recent Examples of habituated
Adjective
This orangutan is well habituated and sometimes come to a nearby feeding station for food. New Atlas, 29 Mar. 2026 As the residential community around Lake Tahoe has grown, bears have been pushed further uphill and become habituated to human food. Madison Chapman, Outside, 25 Mar. 2026 Over the years, individual dingoes deemed too habituated to humans have been euthanized, in consultation with the Butchulla people. Hilary Whiteman, CNN Money, 24 Jan. 2026 In October, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, with help from federal conservation officials, killed four wolves from the Beyem Seyo pack, which had become unusually habituated to preying on cattle from ranches in Sierra Valley. Sharon Bernstein, Sacbee.com, 6 Jan. 2026 But the study authors claim that the process begins much earlier, when animals become habituated to human environments. Marina Wang, Scientific American, 14 Nov. 2025 Using long-term dietary data of habituated chimpanzees from each of the two field sites, the researchers found that chimpanzees consume about 14 grams of pure ethanol per day of foraging, Dudley said. Soo Kim, MSNBC Newsweek, 18 Sep. 2025 The cats have become habituated to the sounds of vehicles, and six jaguars are presently collared and tracked, making their entire life stories visible to researchers. Megan Spurrell, Condé Nast Traveler, 25 Aug. 2025
Verb
In some cases, DEEP said loud noises are not effective at scaring away bears, especially ones that have already been habituated. Stephen Underwood, Hartford Courant, 11 Mar. 2026 With active conflicts in many parts of the world such as Russia-Ukraine, Pakistan-Afghanistan, and in the Middle East, or humanitarian disaster as in Somalia, the people and states in the world are becoming increasingly war-habituated. Debidatta A. Mahapatra, The Orlando Sentinel, 7 Mar. 2026 The process of learning to suppress a response to the rewarding stimulus happens at the level of the reward system—there is a decrease in the size of the dopamine release caused by a particular reward cue once the circuit has become habituated. Literary Hub, 13 Feb. 2026 But last year, one of the state’s 10 resurgent wolf packs became unusually habituated to hunting and eating livestock instead of wild prey. Sharon Bernstein, Sacbee.com, 6 Feb. 2026 Even Americans who have grown habituated to Trump’s excesses have been shaken by these killings and the reflexively cruel and dishonest response from the administration. Hillary Rodham Clinton, The Atlantic, 29 Jan. 2026 In fact, they’d merely been habituated, the way a bird learns to ignore a rhino. AFAR Media, 30 Oct. 2025 These sediments, the researchers observed, had low bacterial diversity compared to other surrounding sediments, and the bacteria came from families habituated to alkaline environments, such as deep-sea hydrothermal vents or alkaline hot springs. Sharon Udasin, The Hill, 9 Sep. 2025
Recent Examples of Synonyms for habituated
Adjective
  • In the short time McDaniel has been with the Chargers, Henley has grown accustomed to the unexpected from him, including sticking his nose into a defensive meeting once in a while.
    Elliott Teaford, Oc Register, 28 May 2026
  • That means that Congress has grown accustomed to backfilling the Highway Trust Fund every few years—accepting the obsolescence of the gas tax rather than bringing it up to speed.
    Henry Grabar, The Atlantic, 27 May 2026
Verb
  • In his brief time in WWE, Danhausen has already haunted (and defeated) the league’s former court-jester extraordinaire, The Miz (Miz, I’d argue, is the better in-ring performer), as well as YouTuber IShowSpeed, (Chad) Gable, Dominik Mysterio and Kit Wilson.
    Tony Maglio, HollywoodReporter, 27 May 2026
  • For more than three decades, the murder of Randy Gail Sperino haunted investigators in southern Illinois — a cold case centered on a young woman beaten to death and left in a rural field while her killer seemingly vanished without a trace.
    Stepheny Price, FOXNews.com, 26 May 2026
Adjective
  • Capsule container Almost all Nespresso machines come with storage to hold used capsules, five or six in smaller models and 10 to 12 in larger machines.
    BestReviews, Mercury News, 1 June 2026
  • Prayer is the most used form of complementary medicine in the United States, relied on by 43% of Americans, the study said.
    Khloe Quill, FOXNews.com, 31 May 2026
Verb
  • Growing up, Choi said, her parents frequented both a specialty Asian store and a mainstream grocery store to stock their kitchen.
    Laya Neelakandan, CNBC, 29 May 2026
  • However, Bounkham has said that the cave was frequented by local residents looking for gold, even though authorities had repeatedly warned them against entering the cave because of safety concerns.
    ABC News, ABC News, 27 May 2026
Verb
  • Epstein visited Interlochen periodically, often with his confidante and former girlfriend Ghislaine Maxwell, and stayed in the lodge now marked for demolition.
    Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Times, 28 May 2026
  • The Star-Telegram’s Bud Kennedy visited Tavern on the Lake in 2024 and gave the food high marks.
    Matthew Adams, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, 28 May 2026

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Cite this Entry

“Habituated.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/habituated. Accessed 3 Jun. 2026.

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