to grab someone's attention
3
3.3
- phrasal verb
- /ɡræb ˈsʌmˌwʌnz əˈtɛnʃən/
:
captar la atención de alguien
- Basically, the mainstream press wants a story: a new and dramatic narrative that will grab the readers' attention.
Examples
-
Some teachers tell stories about their lives in order to grab students' attention.
Academic text (2010) -
Ed tries to grab Tor's attention.
Fiction book (1994) -
I was hoping I could grab your attention for a second.
-
- You gotta grab their attention.
-
Such phrases also grab students' attention.
Academic text (2010) -
Perhaps the greatest advantage of multimedia is its ability to grab and hold students' attention.
Academic text (1996) -
You just need that one phone that will stick out and grab everyone's attention!
Blog text (18) -
Whenever I talk about the business impact of customer experience, there's one thing that always grabs people's attention.
Blog text (23) -
Adept copywriters know this and often use it in their headlines to grab the reader's attention.
Blog text (29) -
To succeed in advertising, you must grab someone's attention within the first few seconds.
Synonyms
∞
4.1
To attract someone's attention or interest
991
1.9
Make people notice or want something
244
2.0
To get someone's attention or interest
238
3.4
To attract and hold someone's strong interest or attention
102
1.6
To get someone's attention suddenly and strongly
71
2.5
To make people notice something or someone
68
3.8
Grab and hold someone's attention suddenly and strongly
39
6.4
To hold someone's full attention as if by magic
37
3.0
To attract and hold someone's interest or affection
33
6.1
To hold someone's full attention because something is very interesting or surprising
29
2.9
To make people notice something important
22
2.8
Make someone notice you or something
19
4.2
To attract and hold someone's full attention
11
3.0
To get noticed and make people interested
8
2.7
Attract someone's attention because it is interesting or noticeable
7
3.5
To attract people or attention
3
3.9
To make people look at or listen to you
1
3.2
To attract and keep people's interest
1
4.9
Make people notice you because they admire or are surprised by you
1
4.4
Make someone notice something
To strongly attract or excite someone
To make someone feel curious about something and want to know more
Antonyms
How Attention-Grabbing
3
3.9
3
3.3
22
2.8
8
2.7
Surface Forms
Morphology
The sense 'to attract or catch someone's notice' is directly derivable from combining 'grab' (to seize or take hold of) with 'attention' (notice or focus); the metaphor of seizing attention is transparent and predictable. This compositional pattern is common cross-linguistically and would be understandable to a B1 learner who knows the constituent words.
Etymology
Grab someone's attention paints a simple picture: to grab is to take hold of something quickly, like grabbing someone's sleeve to make them stop, and attention is their notice. That's why it means 'to make someone notice something quickly'.