gooey

The adjective is derived from goo +‎ -ey (a variant of -y (suffix forming adjectives with the sense ‘having the quality of’)). The noun is derived from the adjective.^[1]

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈɡuːi/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈɡui/

• Audio (General American); /ˈɡui/:

  (file)

• Audio (General American); [ˈɡʉu̯.ii̯]:

  (file)

• Homophone: GUI
• Rhymes: -uːi
• Hyphenation: goo‧ey

gooey (comparative gooeyer or gooier, superlative gooeyest or gooiest) (originally US, informal)

1. Having the consistency of goo: soft or viscous, and sticky.

   Synonyms: goolike, (childish) ooey-gooey, oozy

   Coordinate terms: gummy, icky, slimy, tacky

   gooey liquid covered the floor

   The cookies, soft and gooey, proved a smash hit at the party.

   • 1929 October, P[elham] G[renville] Wodehouse, “Episode of the Dog McIntosh”, in Very Good, Jeeves!, London: Herbert Jenkins Limited […], published 20 June 1930, →OCLC, page 121:

     [O]ysters, ice-cream, and plenty of chocolates with that goo-ey, slithery stuff in the middle. Makes you sick to think of it, eh?

   • 1946, Milton “Mezz” Mezzrow, Bernard Wolfe, “Quit Foolin’ with That Comb”, in Really the Blues, New York, N.Y.: Random House, book 1 (1899–1923: A Nothin’ but a Child), page 46:

     He would dip the point of the yen hok into a jar of dark-brown gooey stuff that looked like tar [opium], then hold a drop over the flame until it began to swell up like a tiny balloon, adding more to it now and then.

   • 1964, “Communications: Tips on the Tipsies”, in PS: The Preventive Maintenance Monthly, number 135, Fort Knox, Ky.: Department of the Army, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 46:

     To avoid the gooiest mess you ever saw, plus the banshee howls of your support people, empty all of the gasoline from the gravity feed gas can of the PU-422/U generator set (which powers both radars).

   • 2009 September 13, Amanda Hesser, “Recipe redux: Huguenot torte, 1965”, in The New York Times Magazine‎^[1], New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 17 June 2022:

     You and your guests will get past the slight appearance problem when you taste the warm finished cake: the brown crust is like the ideal macaroon, and the center has the gooey, custardlike texture of a proper pecan pie.

   • 2021, Sasha Summers, chapter 12, in The Rancher’s Forever Family (Harlequin Special Edition; 2838), Toronto, Ont.: Harlequin Special Edition, →ISBN:

     "That's next. Sprinkle it all over." She nodded at the bowl with the cinnamon, sugar and butter crumble. "The more, the gooier." / He cocked an eyebrow. "Is gooier better for a toddler?" / "Gooier is better for everyone. But let's make sure it's right." She dipped her finger into the bowl.

   • 2022, Kitty Tait, Al Tait, Breadsong: How Baking Changed Our Lives, London: Bloomsbury Publishing, →ISBN, page 276:

     It took months of baking and a lot of choc chips, but finally I cracked the perfect choc chip cookie—gooey in the centre, with a crisp edge and a caramelised nuttiness from the brown butter.

   • 2023, Rob Verchick, “Climate and Castle”, in The Octopus in the Parking Garage: A Call for Climate Resilience, New York, N.Y.; Chichester, West Sussex: Columbia University Press, →ISBN, part I (Understanding Resilience):

     And maybe Hazira was always going to be a gooey marshland, but that doesn't mean you entice the nation's poorest and most dismissed groups to live there.

   • 2023 October 26, Harry Blank, “Wrong Tomorrow […]”, in SCP Foundation (The Breach Goes On; 2)‎^[2], archived from the original on 6 October 2024:

     On 8 September 2003, thanks to a super science waste management facility gone bananas, 8 September 2003 recurs instead and the entire world is changed. For the better, if you ask the seven unlucky sods who originally died, and are now explosively alive. For the worse, if you ask the billions of ordinary people now in daily danger of being atomized, brainwashed, or transmogrified into gooey flesh-sculptures.

2. (figurative)
   1. Emotional or sentimental, especially to an excessive extent; mushy, soppy.

      Synonyms: maudlin, mawkish, treacly

      Antonyms: unemotional, unsentimental

      • 1956 April, H[omer] Nearing, Jr., “The Neurotic Rose”, in Leo Margulies, editor, Fantastic Universe, volume 5, number 3, New York, N.Y.: King-Size Publications, →OCLC, page 87:

        What flower has been bred in more than three thousand varieties, and become the symbol of the gooeyest human sentimentality and pampering?

      • 1958, Raymond Chandler, Playback, 1st American edition, Boston, Mass.: Houghton Mifflin Company […], page 107:

        Nobody goes all gooey over a character like me and talks about having half a million dollars and offers me a trip to Rio and a nice home complete with all the luxuries.

      • 1980, Ella Leffland, “Glad Offerings”, in Last Courtesies and Other Stories, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Row, →ISBN, page 147:

        And that cat turns my stomach. I thought you said Spaniards weren't gooey—I've never seen anybody gooeyer than she is about that thing.

      • 1997, Jonathan Romney, “The Lion King”, in Short Orders: Film Writing, London: Serpent’s Tail, →ISBN, page 129:

        Yet sooner or later, even the most devout Disneyphobe would break down and admit that, as a child, they'd shed an elephant tear or two for Dumbo's mummy; or felt their nose growing Pinocchio-style every time they fibbed about the dog eating their homework; or simply swooned at some gooey gouached sunset.

      • 2002, Regi Claire, chapter 20, in The Beauty Room, Edinburgh: Polygon, Edinburgh University Press, →ISBN, page 157:

        She could still have a family. She could afford it. If she wanted to. But she's never felt the urge. Never felt the gooey drooliness she's observed in other women when they peek into a pram.

   2. (originally New York, archaic) Distasteful, unpleasant.

      Synonyms: see Thesaurus:unpleasant

      Antonyms: see Thesaurus:pleasant

      • 1938 November 15, Walter Winchell, “On Broadway”, in Harold W. Sanford, editor, Democrat and Chronicle, Rochester, N.Y.: Gannett Co., →ISSN, →OCLC, page 6, column 3:

        Mr. Hugh Dillman's Palm Beach divorce suit will be gooey, Three of his golf-playing ???? will be mentioned …

• gooey butter cake
• gooeyness, gooiness
• gooily
• ooey-gooey

• goo
• goolike

gooey (plural gooeys or gooies) (informal)

1. (originally Australia) A thing which is soft or viscous, and sticky.
   • 1964, Kit Reed, chapter II, in At War as Children […], New York, N.Y.: Farrar, Straus and Company, →OCLC, pages 17–18:

     On impulse, Pat stopped at a bakery. […] He came out with a box full of gooies—éclairs, cream horns, Napoleons— […] and we parked outside the college grounds and ate them, yapping at each other and smearing ourselves with chocolate and cream.

   • 1997, Paula Danziger, Amber Brown Sees Red (Amber Brown; 4), New York, N.Y.: G[eorge] P[almer] Putnam’s Sons, →ISBN, page 99:

     I put the "gooeys," green fluorescent snots, into Louie's nose, set up his brain, and get ready to play the game with my mom. We keep putting our fingers up Louie's nose and pulling gooeys out of it.

2. (figurative)
   1. (originally Australia, derogatory, dated) A person who is regarded as weak or worthless; a fool.

      Synonyms: see Thesaurus:worthless person

      • 1911, Edward Dyson, “Dukie M’Kenzie’s Dawnce”, in Benno and Some of the Push (Bookstall Series), Sydney, N.S.W.: N.S.W. Bookstall Company, →OCLC, page 32:

        But only a confirmed chump and irremediable ‘gooey’ comes up for a third ‘chuck.’ […] ‘Jest jollyin’ these gooeys, that’s how’, he said.

   2. (US, chiefly education, psychology) A person who favours closer relationships with other people and less structured settings, rather than formal, organized settings; also, an educational approach, curriculum, etc., which is less structured.

      Antonym: prickly

      • 1976 February 15, Pamela Moore, “Follow Through—Biggest Social Science Study Ever …”, in Daniel S[heldon] Greenberg, editor, Science & Government Report: The Independent Bulletin of Science Policy, volume IV, number 3, Washington, D.C.: Science & Government Report, Inc., →ISSN, →OCLC, page 4, column 2:

        Planned variation was based on systematically applying different educational approaches developed by academic experts, each of whom was to become a "sponsor" of a single type of program – from highly structured classroom models, sometimes called "pricklies," to open classrooms and more exploratory environments, dubbed "gooeys."

      • 1979, Robert C. Wright, “Reminiscing and Romancing in Mid-America: Rumes, Romances, Stories, and Poems”, in Frederick Manfred, Boston, Mass.: Twayne Publishers, G[arrison] K[ent] Hall & Co., →ISBN, page 99:

        Alan Watts says that these two types may be named the "prickly" people and the "gooey" people. The pricklies, he says, the Marthas, are tough-minded, rigorous, and precise and like to stress differences and divisions between things. The gooeys, the Marys, are tender-minded romanticists who love wide generalizations and grand syntheses.

      • 1981 November 9, Ellie McGrath, “‘Pricklies’ vs. ‘Gooeys’: Conflicting Theories of Learning in the Wake of Head Start”, in Henry Anatole Grunwald, editor, Time‎^[3], volume 118, number 19, New York, N.Y.: Time Inc., →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 11 January 2026:

        Which is superior: what is known as low-structure teaching (education through experience) or high-structure instruction (stress on drill in the basics)? Many low-structure advocates, sometimes described as "gooeys," follow the theory, developed since 1920 by New York City's Bank Street College of Education, that learning must adapt to the pace of the individual child. Under this system children learn to read by being provided with a rich environment that stimulates them to learn the words they need. Many high-structure people, known in the trade as "pricklies," use the DISTAR program (for Direct Instruction Systems for Teaching and Remediation) developed at the University of Oregon. DISTAR sticks to phonics, a tightly programmed curriculum and lots of drill. […] [A] more recent local study of comparable New York City neighborhood schools showed gooeys and pricklies scoring about the same. Gooeys consistently argue that standard paper-and-pencil achievement tests are narrow and cannot measure the wide-ranging benefits of their creative approach.

      • 1992, Alan J[ohn] Watson, Anne M. Badenhop, “Introduction: Moving Out of a Shadow”, in Alan J. Watson, Anne M. Badenhop, editors, Prevention of Reading Failure, Gosford, N.S.W.: Ashton Scholastic, →ISBN, page 15:

        The longstanding dispute between the phonics and whole language approaches to early instruction […] has been colourfully described as the ‘Pricklies versus the Gooies’. The ‘Pricklies’ emphasise the structure of the curriculum and provide lots of teacher-directed drill, especially in the teaching of ‘phonics’. The ‘Gooies’ emphasise the child’s self-directed exploration of print. The teacher provides guided experience, especially of whole language, in rich meaningful context.

• Gooey (disambiguation) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

• yooge