ambivalent
/amˈbɪv(ə)l(ə)nt
/adjective
Having mixed feelings or contradictory ideas about something or someone: some loved her, some hated her, few were ambivalent about her an ambivalent attitude to Europe...
- To say that councillors are ambivalent about the idea is an understatement.
- Those sentiments are a far cry from her early years when she had an altogether more ambivalent attitude towards her singing.
- In practice, we have managed to do better than our ambivalent attitudes suggest.
Synonyms
equivocal, uncertain, unsure, doubtful, indecisive, inconclusive, irresolute, in two minds, undecided, unresolved, in a dilemma, on the horns of a dilemma, in a quandary, on the fence, torn, hesitating, fluctuating, wavering, vacillating, equivocating, mixed;
opposing, conflicting, contradictory, clashing;
confused, muddled, vague, hazy, unclear
informal iffy, blowing hot and cold
Derivatives
ambivalently
- The first of these is aesthetic, the second political, but both inform her ambivalently negative attitudes towards still photography.
- Both were deeply but ambivalently bonded with their male sidekicks and, to both, women were simultaneously a lure and a threat.
- Clifford looks forward ambivalently to the day when such concerns will not be his.
Origin
Early 20th century: from ambivalence (from German Ambivalenz), on the pattern of equivalent.