childlike

From child +‎ -like.

• IPA^(key): /ˈt͡ʃaɪldlaɪk/

• Audio (Southern England):

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childlike (comparative more childlike, superlative most childlike)

1. Innocent and trustful; credulous; artless.

   Synonyms: credulous, unworldly; see also Thesaurus:naive

   • 2019 August 22, Matthew H. Birkhold, “A Brief History of the Indignities Heaped Upon Greenland”, in The New York Times‎^[1], archived from the original on 16 July 2020:

     According to the prevailing Danish rationale, Greenlanders were naïve and childlike, in need of protection and incapable of governing themselves.

2. Of, like, or suitable for a child.

   Synonyms: childish, childly; see also Thesaurus:childlike

   • 2019 May 8, Jon Bailes, “Save yourself! The video games casting us as helpless children”, in The Guardian‎^[2], archived from the original on 9 April 2023:

     Even Mario is given childlike mannerisms – running open-armed like a fearless toddler, whooping with delight – to convey playful innocence.

• 1859, Henry Barnard, Pestalozzi and Pestalozzianism:

  And on the other hand, fatherly and childlike feelings in the national spirit, are the sources of all pure national blessings.

• 1894, Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, Lessings Nathan Der Weise:

  He certainly has childlike simplicity, and all the qualities which go to make up a true Christian character.

• childish

• William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “childlike”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.
• “childlike”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.