{
    "term": "encounter",
    "partOfSpeech": "verb",
    "academic": true,
    "ox3000": true,
    "cefr": "b2",
    "verbForms": {
        "presentSimple": {
            "iYouWeThey": "encounter",
            "heSheIt": "encounters"
        },
        "pastSimple": "encountered",
        "pastParticiple": "encountered",
        "ingForm": "encountering"
    },
    "definitions": [
        {
            "senseNumber": 1,
            "definition": "to experience something, especially something unpleasant or difficult, while you are trying to do something else",
            "sensetop": "encounter something",
            "cefr": "b2",
            "ox3000": true,
            "examples": [
                {
                    "text": "We **encountered** a number of **difficulties **in the first week."
                },
                {
                    "text": "The report details the **problems encountered** by families in this situation."
                },
                {
                    "text": "I had never encountered such resistance before."
                }
            ],
            "synonyms": "meet (8), run into",
            "collocations": {
                "adverb": ["commonly", "frequently", "often"],
                "verb + encounter": ["be likely to"]
            }
        },
        {
            "senseNumber": 2,
            "definition": "to meet somebody, or discover or experience something, especially somebody/something new, unusual or unexpected",
            "sensetop": "encounter somebody/something",
            "labels": "(formal)",
            "cefr": "b2",
            "ox3000": true,
            "examples": [
                {
                    "text": "She was the most remarkable woman he had ever encountered."
                },
                {
                    "text": "Plant scientists first encountered the phenomenon in the 1930s."
                },
                {
                    "text": "an idea I first encountered when I was in the army"
                },
                {
                    "text": "Researchers at the isolated Arctic outpost encounter a creature from outer space."
                },
                {
                    "text": "Walruses were commonly encountered in the Shetland Islands until quite recently."
                }
            ],
            "collocations": {
                "adverb": ["commonly", "frequently", "often"],
                "verb + encounter": ["be likely to"]
            }
        }
    ],
    "pronunciations": {
        "uk": [
            {
                "pronunciation": "/ɪnˈkaʊntə(r)/",
                "audio": "en/encounter/encounter__gb_1.mp3"
            },
            {
                "pronunciation": "/ɪnˈkaʊntəz/",
                "audio": "en/encounter/encounters__gb_1.mp3"
            },
            {
                "pronunciation": "/ɪnˈkaʊntəd/",
                "audio": "en/encounter/encountered__gb_1.mp3"
            },
            {
                "pronunciation": "/ɪnˈkaʊntərɪŋ/",
                "audio": "en/encounter/encountering__gb_1.mp3"
            }
        ],
        "us": [
            {
                "pronunciation": "/ɪnˈkaʊntər/",
                "audio": "en/encounter/encounter__us_5.mp3"
            },
            {
                "pronunciation": "/ɪnˈkaʊntərz/",
                "audio": "en/encounter/encounters__us_1.mp3"
            },
            {
                "pronunciation": "/ɪnˈkaʊntərd/",
                "audio": "en/encounter/encountered__us_1.mp3"
            },
            {
                "pronunciation": "/ɪnˈkaʊntərɪŋ/",
                "audio": "en/encounter/encountering__us_1.mp3"
            }
        ]
    },
    "wordOrigin": "Middle English (in the senses ‘meet as an adversary’ and ‘a meeting of adversaries’; formerly also as incounter): from Old French encontrer (verb), encontre (noun), based on Latin in- ‘in’ + contra ‘against’."
}