Word.ws English Dictionary

How to use deterrent in a sentence

21 example sentences · adjective, noun

Deterrent means serving to deter, preventing something from happening. Example: “Rome used crucifixions as a deterrent, and standard for the 'vilest' crimes, such as slave rebellion.”

Examples of deterrent by meaning

nounSomething that deters.

  • An extension of the system to serve new housing estates on the outskirts of the city, at an estimated cost of about £4,000,000 a mile, is being considered, but the narrow gauge, small clearances, and short platforms are deterrents.1955 January, Charles E. Lee, “The Glasgow Underground Railway”, in Railway Magazine, page 23
  • Along with trial by ordeal, hanging was the most effective deterrent that could be devised in an age without police or prisons.1999, Robert Lacey, Danny Danziger, The Year 1000: What life was like at the turn of The First Millennium, London: Abacus, published 2000...
  • The salarians believed the genophage would be used as a deterrent, a position the turians viewed as naive.2008, BioWare, Mass Effect (Science Fiction), Redwood City: Electronic Arts, →ISBN, →OCLC, PC, scene: Krogan: Genophage Codex entry

More sentences with deterrent

  • Rome used crucifixions as a deterrent, and standard for the 'vilest' crimes, such as slave rebellion.From the entry crucifixion
  • The mutuality of mutually assured destruction is key to its function as a deterrent.From the entry mutuality
  • Their behaviour is appalling and the presence of CCTV no deterrent.2024 November 13, Paul Bigland, “Much to admire... but pockets of neglect”, in RAIL, number 1022, page 48. From the entry appalling
  • But in today’s market there are other deterrents for would-be stoozers.2014 June 19, Sophie Christie, “£5000 a year for nothing: could 'stoozing' make a comeback?”, in The Telegraph. From the entry stoozer
  • The law needs to punish this behaviour as a deterrent to others.2007, Matthew Weait, Intimacy and Responsibility: The Criminalisation of HIV Transmission, Routledge, →ISBN, page 80. From the entry punish
  • The problem of the deterrent has merely been displaced to the irresponsible and the fanatical.1990, Christine Brooke-Rose, Verbivore, Carcanet, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 47. From the entry superwarhead
  • In order for a weapon system to be an effective deterrent it must be highly survivable.1972, Naval Engineers Journal, volume 84, page 274. From the entry survivable
  • It embodies one of the core deterrent mechanisms built into the treaty against the torture of POWs, that of nonabsolvable liability.2008, United States. Congress. House. Committee on the Judiciary, Ensuring Legal Redress for American Victims of State-Sponsored…. From the entry nonabsolvable
  • If you want your pack to be a deterrent against burglars or muggers, forget about small dogs, yappers though they be.2004, Theresa Mancus, Who moved my bone?: a guide for multi-dog households, page 25. From the entry yapper
  • For many of us with rural fantasies, a common deterrent is the fear of being all alone out there in heteroland.1996, Michael Riordon, Out Our Way: Gay and Lesbian Life in the Country, page 156. From the entry heteroland
  • As I said earlier, I developed a pesterer deterrent of talking to myself, but even that isn't a recent quirk.1983, Bill Oddie, Gone Birding, London: Methuen, page 8. From the entry pesterer
  • In this and other articles Russett advocated a countercombatant deterrent.1979, Worldview, page 48. From the entry countercombatant
  • The effort by Paris to portray its nuclear weapons as the 'European deterrent' (or Euro-deterrent) failed to win many hearts and minds in Europe.2015, Ramesh Thakur, “The Nuclear Debate”, in Nuclear Weapons and International Security: Collected Essays, Abingdon, Oxon.; New York…. From the entry Eurodeterrent
  • The co-occurrence of conspicuous coloration and noxious characteristics in many coastal marine species suggests that aposematism is a common predator deterrent in the marine environment.1990 June, Mary [K.] Wicksten, compiler, Adaptive Coloration in Invertebrates: Proceedings of a Symposium Sponsored by the American…. From the entry aposematism
  • It is the thesis of this article that the broad outlines of such a deterrent would include an ethnic-based countercombatant, counterindustrial targeting doctrine.1985, Kenneth M. Currie, Gregory Varhall, The Soviet Union: What Lies Ahead? : Military-political Affairs in the 1980s, page 388. From the entry countercombatant
  • The expense and hassle of that requirement acts as a deterrent to car ownership, and an inducement to travel by other modes like transit or a bicycle.2022 September 6, David Zipper, “How Japan Won its ‘Traffic War’”, in Bloomberg Terminal. From the entry streetside
  • How much more rational, and probably equally deterrent, it would be to mulct a wilful misdemeanant in work-coupons than to shut him up in a dark room!1921, Montagu Lomax, The Experiences of an Asylum Doctor, London: Allen & Unwin, page 114. From the entry misdemeanant
  • The author criticizes this method of damage calculation and provides examples of how it can "miscompensate" plaintiff for economic loss, leading to an inefficient deterrent effect and excessive social costs.1989, The Trade-mark Reporter - Volume 79, page 214. From the entry miscompensate

Meaning of deterrent

  1. adjective Serving to deter, preventing something from happening.
  2. noun Something that deters.

Full definition of deterrent

Questions about deterrent in a sentence

How do you use deterrent in a sentence?
Deterrent is used as an adjective and noun. For example: “Rome used crucifixions as a deterrent, and standard for the 'vilest' crimes, such as slave rebellion.”
What is a short sentence with deterrent?
“In this and other articles Russett advocated a countercombatant deterrent.”
What does deterrent mean?
Deterrent means serving to deter, preventing something from happening.

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: deterrent (page history and authors) and the entries each sentence comes from. Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws chose the sentences, left out offensive ones and quotations older than 1900, and marked the word in each. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this page: “How to use deterrent in a sentence.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sentences/deterrent. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.