to act superior
1
6.7
- phrasal verb
:
actuar con superioridad
- I'm sick of you acting superior!
Examples
-
You get to travel around, act superior than everyone else, and eventually, you go home, get some boring job, have too many kids.
-
He constantly acts superior when discussing his wealth, making others feel uncomfortable.
-
I thought it was a way of acting superior.
-
You were talking about other people coming on here acting superior?
Blog text (20) -
So am I the A hole for acting superior at my middle school reunion?
-
It also provides them with a large ego that can make them act superior and could interfere with new learning.
Academic text (2007) -
Gus was such a perfectionist himself; it was satisfying for once to be able to act superior.
Fiction book (1995) -
He's getting confused about points on which there isn't confusion, or at least, is acting superior by pretending there is.
Blog text (10) -
It can be a very powerful and liberating thing to realize that a large percentage of the people who act superior to you are actually inferior... and not bright enough to realize it.
Blog text (12) -
She tends to act superior in meetings, often dismissing the ideas of her colleagues.
Synonyms
8
7.5
To treat other people as if you are better than them
7
8.2
Treat someone as if you are better than them
6
8.2
Act as if you are better than other people
4
8.4
Act as if you are better than other people
Behave as if others are less important
Talk to someone in a way that shows you feel better than them
To act as if you are better than others and tell them they are wrong
How Self-Righteous
- Informal
- Offensive
15
6.6
1
6.7
45
3.4
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning is directly derivable from combining 'act' (to behave) with 'superior' (having higher status): a learner who knows both words can infer someone is behaving as if they are above others. This 'act + adjective' construction is a common, cross-linguistic pattern for describing behaviour, so the expression is transparently comprehensible to a B1 learner.
Etymology
Act superior comes from the simple image of someone standing on a higher step and looking down, with act showing how a person behaves and superior meaning higher. So, to act superior means to behave as if you are 'better' than other people.