Meaning & use
uncompassionate
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Meaning
adjectivecomparabledisapproving
Showing no concern for the suffering of others; lacking kindness or the wish to help.
Grammar: Used before a noun or after a linking verb: an uncompassionate boss; he seemed uncompassionate.
Patterns
- uncompassionate toward someone
- uncompassionate about something
The manager was uncompassionate toward staff who had family emergencies.
It seemed uncompassionate to ignore the lost child.
She felt the letter was cold and uncompassionate.
Word forms
| comparative | more uncompassionate |
|---|---|
| superlative | most uncompassionate |
Common combinations
- uncompassionate toward
- The judge was uncompassionate toward the accused.
- an uncompassionate response
- The company's uncompassionate response upset many customers.
- uncompassionate attitude
- His uncompassionate attitude made people avoid him.
- appear uncompassionate
- I did not want to appear uncompassionate, but I could not lend more money.
- uncompassionate treatment
- The report criticized the uncompassionate treatment of patients.
Synonyms and how they differ
- heartless
- Heartless is more emotional and common, suggesting a deep lack of feeling, while uncompassionate is calmer and more formal.
- unsympathetic
- Unsympathetic means not showing understanding of someone's problems, and can be milder than uncompassionate.
- callous
- Callous suggests hardened, cruel indifference, and is stronger than uncompassionate.
- cold-hearted
- Cold-hearted is informal and vivid, whereas uncompassionate is neutral and a little formal.
Opposites
Word family
- compassion noun
- sympathy and a wish to help those who suffer
- compassionate adjective
- feeling or showing sympathy for others
- compassionately adverb
- in a caring way
- uncompassionately adverb
- in a way that shows no sympathy
Commonly confused: uncompassionate or impassionate?
uncompassionate vs impassionate
This is not a standard word; learners may mean dispassionate, which means calm and unemotional, not unkind.
Practice
The landlord's ___ reply to the tenant who lost her job shocked her neighbors.
Choose one answer.
Uncompassionate means showing no concern for suffering, which fits a cold reply to someone in trouble. Impartial means fair and unbiased, not unkind.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “uncompassionate”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.