verb
COLLOCATIONS FROM OTHER ENTRIES
confuse/cloud/muddy the issue (=make an issue more difficult to understand or deal with than it needs to be)
▪ You must not let your feelings cloud the issue.
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
■ ADVERB
about
▪ Some are also unaware or confused about where to obtain birth control and what this involves.
▪ Numbers Most business writers get confused about when to spell out numbers and when to use numerals.
▪ Two of the stories in the new book also are about confused middle-aged men.
▪ The trick is not to get confused about which is which.
▪ Understand your priorities People are often confused about where to put the limited sums they can save.
more
▪ The more you try to decipher the more confusing it becomes.
▪ But for newcomers, it also has never been more confusing to get started.
▪ He could get no real grip on the situation, and the more he pondered, the more confused his thinking became.
▪ All of which left me even more confused.
▪ The keepers were more confused than the eagle was.
▪ He said voters also may pay the price of an early primary with a more confusing ballot in November.
▪ I was more confused than thrilled.
often
▪ Female speaker Carers are often confused because they don't know which of the many agencies to go to.
▪ Freyja Freyja and Frigg are often confused and sometimes indistinguishable, but Freyja possesses a number of important individual traits.
▪ Bullies are often confused by people who don't fight back but who continue to do what is right.
▪ Gentiles are often confused about proper behavior, gifts, and attire.
▪ Sandy Shores Prawns and shrimps are often confused.
▪ As a result, the advice that physicians and the media offer people based on what these experts say is often confusing.
so
▪ He thought back and ... and it was all so confused and seemed so long ago.
▪ Getting a phone call at the Writers' Club had so confused me that I became half deaf.
▪ Yet he had looked at her today - Lord, she was so confused.
▪ But as for me, I have not been so confused since high school geometry.
▪ How could he be so confused?
▪ But it can be so confusing for women.
▪ Was she a silly adolescent girl to be so confused and seduced by a handsome face? a beautiful body?
▪ Matson writes of her going to a Christmas party, where the conversations seem so confusing.
sometimes
▪ This might hamstring the government and its operation was sometimes confusing to foreign observers.
▪ The clubs' history, as presented, is dizzying, sometimes confusing.
▪ Some one else who is sometimes confused perhaps likes a trip to the pub at lunch-time.
▪ Needless to say, it sometimes confuses the diagnosis.
▪ It is therefore unsurprising that such seizures are sometimes confused with panic attacks.
too
▪ We hope you don't find this too confusing.
▪ There, but too confused for events to register in my memory.
▪ He was still too confused for any sort of confrontation with the old man.
▪ Corporate intranets, immensely popular in the business world, may prove too confusing to use and too expensive to maintain.
▪ It was all too quick, too confusing.
▪ The worst thing we as consumers can do is to give up or not bother because it's all too confusing.
▪ You were too confused by how the city and the people looked to you.
very
▪ To be sure, this is not the only criterion: the voices of other Christians may be very confused.
▪ Bumper sticker thinking only adds to what is already a very confusing time for organizations and the people within them.
▪ Inconsistencies can be very confusing for young children and conflicting attitudes over toilet training and discipline can lead to frustration and unhappiness.
▪ Like a lot of people around here say, he has these very confused white people as parents.
▪ Different definitions of charity for different purposes, for example, charity, tax, rating, would be very confusing.
▪ What seem the simplest phrases in journalese shorthand can be very confusing.
▪ Angie is a very confused lady at the moment, according to Freya Copeland, who plays Emmerdale's popular police sergeant.
▪ I am now very confused about the whole thing.
■ NOUN
issue
▪ It was the enlightened afrancesados who were to confuse political issues by their peculiar relation to liberalism.
▪ This attempt to confuse the issue went unanswered, and Santa Anna continued his preparations to advance on the capital.
▪ The politicians, on the lookout for arguments to extend their authoritarianism, jumped at this opportunity to confuse the issue.
▪ The Catholic arguments confuse the issue, but this time, for all the wrong reasons, the Pope is infallible.
▪ Perceptions, such as hers, distort the truth and confuse the issue.
▪ We must be careful not to confuse two issues here.
▪ To take them back west would he to confuse some issue that she did not want confused.
people
▪ Or was he merely seeking to confuse people in the West who have been calling for military intervention?
▪ The feuding between ministers during the revivals had robbed them of some prestige and had confused people who were looking for stability.
▪ You can confuse people even more thoroughly with windows.
▪ Like a lot of people around here say, he has these very confused white people as parents.
▪ Callie had seemed confused by outside people sometimes understanding her and sometimes not.
▪ But it's not a name that will directly confuse people.
▪ This is confusing to people who think Hebrew and Yiddish are the same.
reader
▪ Do not confuse your reader with technical terms or jargon.
▪ Worse, it confuses your readers and makes a potentially interesting message boring.
▪ While this may be historically correct, the change of notation may be confusing to some readers.
■ VERB
become
▪ She became very upset and confused, clearly feeling that Balbinder's failure was her fault.
▪ The electrons become confused, often losing track of the partner they brought to the dance.
▪ My mind, once sound as a bell, became muddled and confused.
▪ But, the reader will become confused and distracted by passives, so avoid them.
▪ Victoria has lost her clarity and her fish have become confused.
▪ Male moths become confused by the signals and are unable to find mates.
▪ Alfred was like us, cool and real, but as the police moved in on him things became a bit confused.
▪ This is where the present bounty hunter story has become confused.
feel
▪ Very often arrears mounted just when borrowers were least able to cope with the situation; they felt vulnerable and confused.
▪ He felt confused, suspicious, betrayed.
▪ But it has left me feeling rather - confused.
▪ I had a feeling our house confused him.
▪ He felt dazed and confused because he could not decide what Jeopardy had meant by his remark.
▪ If Bruno felt confused or anxious, he could always simply smile and lie there.
get
▪ Knowing him, he'd keep them shut even if he was awake, just to get me confused.
▪ I get confused and climb the wrong staircase.
▪ Sometimes I get confused between work and socialising, especially when we spend our off-duty time discussing what we did on duty.
▪ Numbers Most business writers get confused about when to spell out numbers and when to use numerals.
▪ It's hardly surprising then, that we get confused by the signals he gives out - now more than ever.
▪ We began sorting them into different area sizes as we were getting confused with those we had and didn't have.
▪ Switzer got confused or tongue-tied again Thursday.
look
▪ Daak had looked confused: he marched straight to Ace, but seemed not to know what to do next.
▪ If it sits there and looks confused for several seconds, be patient.
▪ Jenna looked different, confused, more alive than usual.
▪ She stops, then, looking confused.
▪ Moira looked at her, confused.
▪ I looked at him, confused.
▪ He looked confused and swallowed repeatedly.
seem
▪ It seems you confuse Third World countries.
▪ There is a perfectly logical reason why it seems so pointless and confusing.
▪ Struan seems to confuse these two uses.
▪ People seem confused, tensions run high, and constant crisis is a fact of organizational life.
▪ Much of the technical literature on the subject seems to confuse the two sets of questions distinguished in this section.
▪ They may seem confused, as if they are in their own world.
▪ More importantly, Griffin seems either to be confused or just wrong about consciousness.
▪ Callie had seemed confused by outside people sometimes understanding her and sometimes not.
PHRASES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
color me surprised/confused/embarrassed etc
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
▪ Don't show him the other way of doing it - it'll only confuse him.
▪ His sudden change in mood completely confused her.
▪ I always confuse Anthea with her sister - they're so alike.
▪ I hope my explanation didn't confuse everybody.
▪ I think my explanation only confused matters further.
▪ The instructions just confused me even more.
▪ The Press Secretary gave a completely different version of events, which greatly confused the situation.
▪ The twins liked to confuse their teachers by switching seats.
▪ Try not to confuse "your" and "you're".
▪ You don't write a resume to get a job; you write it to get an interview - don't get the two things confused.
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ His policies, especially in the first two years of his presidency, often have been confusing and contradictory.
▪ It is only by confusing them that Atkins can hold that mathematics and physical reality are identical.
▪ It would be difficult to confuse this with any other species.
▪ She was confusing him with her old dreams.
▪ This nomenclature tends to confuse the terminology.
▪ We must be careful not to confuse two issues here.