healthful
English
Alternative forms
- healthfull (archaic)
Etymology
From Middle English helthful, helþful, helþeful, equivalent to health + -ful.
Adjective
healthful (comparative healthfuller or more healthful, superlative healthfullest or most healthful)
- Beneficial to bodily health.
- 1906, Princeton Alumni Weekly (volume 7, page 210)
- Hockey is an exciting and healthful form of exercise, well suited to college students […]
- 1906, Princeton Alumni Weekly (volume 7, page 210)
- Conducive to moral or spiritual prosperity; salutary.
- 1926, Ernest Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises, Folio Society 2008, p. 30:
- As he had been thinking for months about leaving his wife and had not done it because it would be too cruel to deprive her of himself, her departure was a very healthful shock.
- 1926, Ernest Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises, Folio Society 2008, p. 30:
Synonyms
Usage notes
When a clearer distinction is intended, healthy is used to describe the state of the object, and healthful describes its ability to impart health to the recipient. Vegetables in good condition are both healthy (i.e., not rotten or diseased) and healthful (i.e., they improve the eaters' health, compared to eating junk food). By contrast, a poisonous plant can be healthy, but it is not healthful to eat of.
Derived terms
Related terms
Translations
beneficial to health
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