Word Confusion: Dose versus Doze

Posted February 23, 2013 by Kathy Davie in Author Resources, Self-Editing, Word Confusions, Writing

Sometimes I’m not sure if I’m reading Keystone Kops or a serious story when I fall across this particular confusion.

Of course, it’s always possible that somewhere in the storyline someone is intending to slip a dose of poison to a dozing person or . . . is that bore someone into dozing himself into a dose?

Wait, I’m confused . . .

Word Confusions . . .

. . . started as my way of dealing with a professional frustration with properly spelled words that were out of context in manuscripts I was editing as well as books I was reviewing. It evolved into a sharing of information with y’all. I’m hoping you’ll share with us words that have been a bête noire for you from either end.

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Dose Doze

Orange Pills in Blisters on a White Background is under the CC BY 2.0 license, via Flickr.

Multiple doses coming right up.
Dozing Kitten is in the public domain, via Max Pixel.
Part of Grammar:
Noun;
Verb, intransitive & transitive

Plural for the noun: doses
Gerund: dosing

Third person present verb: doses
Past tense or past participle: dosed
Present participle: dosing

Noun 1; Verb 2; Verb 1, intransitive & transitive

Plural for the noun: dozes
Gerund: dozing

Third person present verb: dozes
Past tense or past participle: dozed
Present participle: dozing

Noun:
Quantity of medicine or drug taken or recommended to be taken at a particular time

A substance, situation, or quantity of anything analogous to medicine, especially of something disagreeable

[Vinification] An amount of sugar added in the production of champagne

[Physics] The quantity of ionizing radiation absorbed by a unit mass of matter, especially living tissue

[Slang] A case of gonorrhea or syphilis

Verb, intransitive:
To take a dose of medicine

Verb, transitive:
Administer a quantity of medicine or drug to a person or animal

  • Adulterate or blend a substance with another substance

To divide as a medicine into doses

To treat with an application or agent

Noun:
A short light sleep 1

  • Nap

Verb:
[Informal] To clear or level with a bulldozer 2

Verb, intransitive:
Sleep lightly or fitfully 1

  • Fall lightly asleep

[Often followed by off] To fall into a light sleep unintentionally

To sleep for a short time

  • Nap

To be dull or half asleep

Verb, transitive:
To pass or spend time in drowsiness (often followed by away) 1

Examples:
Noun:
Take a dose of cold medicine before you go to bed.

Be careful that the dose of radiation doesn’t exceed the safety limits.

Damn, I got a dose of the clap.

I wanted to give you a dose of the hell you put me through.

Computer games are great in small doses.

Failing the exam was a hard dose to swallow.

I prefer champagnes with less sugar, such as an extra-brut which has a dose between 0 and 6 grams per liter of residual sugars.

Kenny added a healthy dose of skepticism to the discussion.

Verb, intransitive:
He is forever dosing but he is only getting worse.

Verb, transitive:
He dosed himself with vitamins.

The champagne was dosed with sugar.

That creep dosed my drink!

Most patients are dosed at 50 milligrams per day.

Noun:
I had a short doze this afternoon.

After lunch, I had a doze.

He slipped off into a light doze.

Verb:
You’ll need to doze that house down by tomorrow afternoon.

Doze that hill down now.

Use the bulldozer to doze the wall down.

Verb, intransitive:
He found his mother dozing by the fire.

No, he’s just dozing.

I must have dozed off.

Verb, transitive:
He dozed away the afternoon.

He dozed the summer away.

“The room is empty of everything but the bed in which I lie, a small table, and a plain wooden chair occupied by a dozing Helene” (Tahir).

Derivatives:
Adjective: well-dosed
Noun: dosage, doser, superdose, underdose
Verb, transitive: underdose, underdosed, underdosing
Adjective: dozy
Noun: dozer
Phrasal Verb
doze off
History of the Word:
Late Middle English from the French, via late Latin from the Greek dosis meaning gift from didonai meaning give.
  1. Mid-17th century in the sense of stupefy, bewilder, or make drowsy. It may be related to the Danish døse meaning make drowsy.
  2. 1940-45 as a shortened form of bulldoze.

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C’mon, get it out of your system, bitch, whine, moan . . . which words are your pet peeves? Also, please note that I try to be as accurate as I can, but mistakes happen or I miss something. Email me if you find errors, so I can fix them . . . and we’ll all benefit!

Satisfy your curiosity about other Word Confusions on its homepage or more generally explore the index of self-editing posts. You may also want to explore Book Layout & Formatting Ideas, Formatting Tips, Grammar Explanations, Linguistics, Publishing Tips, the Properly Punctuated, Writing Ideas and Resources, and Working Your Website.

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Resources for Dose versus Doze

Some of these links may be affiliate links, and I will earn a small percentage, if you should buy it. It does not affect the price you pay.

Apple Dictionary.com

Dictionary.com: dose, doze

The Free Dictionary: doze

Merriam-Webster: dose

Tahir, Sabaa. An Ember in the Ashes. Razorbill, 2015. <https://amzn.to/3A6eje8>. Ebook.

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Pinterest Photo Credits:

Contemplation by Stu is under the CC BY-SA 2.0 license, via Flickr.

Revised as of 10 Apr 2024
By: Kathy Davie