elicit
/ɪˈlɪsɪt/
elicit verb: to evoke, educe (emotions, feelings, responses, etc.); to generate, obtain, or provoke as a response or answer.
Verb
elicit (third-person singular simple present elicits, present participle eliciting, simple past and past participle elicited)
- To evoke, educe (emotions, feelings, responses, etc.); to generate, obtain, or provoke as a response or answer.
- Shouts of laughter were elicited, smart biddings drawn out, from the whispers of a timid miss, to the stentorian voice of a fox-hunting squire, and not a few fracas from parties either contending for a supposed prize, or disclaiming their chance for it,...1842, [anonymous collaborator of Letitia Elizabeth Landon], “(please specify the page)”, in Lady Anne Granard; or, Keeping up Appearances. […], volume II, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC, pages...
- Elizabeth's queenship elicited her subjects' fantasies and fears that she was, as Shakespeare's Cleopatra puts it, “no more but e'en a woman,” and that a woman ruling over men would necessarily subject her entire realm to unbridled feminine sexual desire.1994, M. Lindsey Kaplan, Katherine Eggert, ““Good queen, my lord, good queen” - Sexual Slander and the Trials of Female Authority in “The Winter's Tale””, in Renaissance Drama, volume 25, →DOI, page...
- To draw out, bring out, bring forth (something latent); to obtain information from someone or something.
- Fred wished to elicit the time of the meeting from Jane.
- Did you elicit a response?
- To use logic to arrive at truth; to derive by reason.
Adjective
elicit (not comparable)
- Elicited; drawn out; made real; open; evident.
- An elicit act of equity.1660, Jeremy Taylor, Ductor Dubitantium, or the Rule of Conscience in All Her General Measures; […], volume (please specify |volume=I or II), London: […] James Flesher, for Richard Royston […], →OCLC
elicit meaning in Tamil, Urdu, Bengali and Malayalam
elicit in Tamil
- மெய்மையை வருவி, மெய்ம்மையினை வருவித்தல், வெளிக்கொணர், வெளியிடச் செய், வெளியிடச்செய், கிளிர்த்தல்
elicit in Urdu
- to elicit, instigate, kindle, lift, stimulate, underscore, vex
- ابھارنا ubhārnā
elicit in Bengali
- বাইরে বের করে আনা, তথ্য, প্রতিক্রিয়া সংগ্রহ করা
elicit in Malayalam
- bring out, obtain, draw out
- വെളിയിൽ വരുത്തുക, വെളിപ്പെടുത്തുക, പുറത്തേക്കു കൊണ്ടുവരുക, കരസ്ഥമാക്കുക, പിഴിഞ്ഞെടുക്കുക, ചൂന്നെടുക്കുക
More languagesFewer languages
- elicit in Kannada
- ಸಮಾಚಾರ ಹೊರತರು, ಸುದ್ದಿಗಳನ್ನು ಹೊರತರು, ಹೊರಹೊಮ್ಮಿಸು, ಮನೋಗತವನ್ನು ತಿಳಿ
- elicit in Arabic
- يُهَيِّج yuhayyij, يُوْقِظ yuwqiẓ, اِنْتَزَعَ intazaʕa
Examples of elicit in a sentence
- […] not only did I fail to renew his old feelings towards you, but I could not even succeed in eliciting the reason of his alienation.1920, Cicero, translated by Evelyn Shirley Shuckburgh, The Letters of Cicero: The Whole Extant Correspondence in Chronological Order...
- He visited three department stores in New York and asked the attendant a question that would elicit the answer fourth floor; for example, he might have asked Excuse me, where are women's shoes?2009, William B. McGregor, Linguistics: An Introduction Answer Key:
Synonyms of elicit
Forms of elicit
| third-person singular present | elicits |
|---|---|
| present participle | eliciting |
| past participle | elicited |
| past | elicited |
Origin of elicit
Borrowed from Latin elicitus from eliciō (“draw forth”).
Words formed from elicit
Words that rhyme with elicit
Questions about elicit
- What does elicit mean?
- Elicit means to evoke, educe (emotions, feelings, responses, etc.); to generate, obtain, or provoke as a response or answer.
- What is elicit in Tamil?
- Elicit in Tamil is மெய்மையை வருவி, மெய்ம்மையினை வருவித்தல், வெளிக்கொணர். See Elicit meaning in Tamil.
- How do you use elicit in a sentence?
- […] not only did I fail to renew his old feelings towards you, but I could not even succeed in eliciting the reason of his alienation.
- What part of speech is elicit?
- Elicit can be a verb or an adjective.
- How do you pronounce elicit?
- Elicit is pronounced /ɪˈlɪsɪt/.
- What is the past tense of elicit?
- The past tense of elicit is elicited.
Words near elicit in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: elicit (page history and authors); elicit (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); ابھارنا (Urdu) (page history and authors); Elicit (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); elicit (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); elicit (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-elicit.ogg.
Cite this entry: “elicit.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/elicit. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.