Word Study
hesitant
CIDE DICTIONARY
hesitant, a. [L. haesitans, p. pr. of haesitare: cf. F. hésitant. See Hesitate.].
- Not prompt in deciding or acting; hesitating. [1913 Webster]
- Unready in speech. Baxter. [1913 Webster]
OXFORD DICTIONARY
hesitant, adj. hesitating; irresolute.
Derivative
hesitance n. hesitancy n. hesitantly adv.
THESAURUS
hesitant
afraid, agnostic, ambiguous, ambivalent, averse, backward, bashful, boggling, canny, capricious, careful, cautious, chancy, changeable, circumspect, deliberate, demurring, dicey, diffident, discreet, dithering, doubting, equivocal, erratic, faltering, fickle, fluctuating, gingerly, guarded, halting, heedful, hesitating, incalculable, indecisive, indefinite, indemonstrable, indisposed, irresolute, jibbing, judicious, leaving out nothing, loath, mindful, modest, noncommittal, of two minds, on guard, overlooking no possibility, pause, pawky, politic, polysemous, prudent, qualmish, regardful, reluctant, safe, scrupling, scrupulous, shilly-shallying, shrinking, shy, skeptical, slow to act, squeamish, stammering, sticking, stickling, straining, stuttering, tentative, thorough, timid, touch-and-go, unaccountable, unadventurous, uncertain, uncommunicative, unconfirmable, unconvinced, undaring, undecided, undivinable, uneager, unenterprising, unforeseeable, unpersuaded, unprecipitate, unpredictable, unprovable, unresolved, unsettled, unsure, unverifiable, unwilling, vacillating, vacillatory, variable, wavering, whimsical, wobblyFor further exploring for "hesitant" in Webster Dictionary Online