Afraid scared frightened

hrsaneiHi.
What is the difference between the following words?
Frightened
Afraid
scared
terrified
They are very confusing, at lease nothing can be understood from dictionaries definitions.
Thanks

They all basically mean the same thing, synonyms, but with different connotations (emotional).

Most would, probably, sa

Hi.

Thanks for your reply.

I do not consider them synonymous at all. I personally use them in different context, but I just cannot explain my students to distinguish the differences.

For instance you can say

I am afriad of spiders but you won't say I am frightened of spiders. Afraid is mostly used when you are talking about your feelings which are

The other difference is that afraid and scared cannot be used before nouns, whereas, frightened can be used.

Ex. frightened residents , scared/afraid residents

I think there are still a lot more differences exist.

hrsaneiHi.
Thanks for your reply.
I do not consider them synonymous at all. I personally use them in different context, but I just cannot explain my students to distinguish the differences.
For instance you can say
I am afriad of spiders but you won't say I am frightened of spiders. Afraid is mostly used when you are talking about your feelings which are t

I just posted the following phrases in the corpus of contemporary American English and got these results.

1. Scared to death (687 Examples )

2. Frightened to death (31 Examples)

3. Afraid to death (0 Examples)

The reason scared is more common than frightened might be more of a colocation here but afraid is completely wrong in that context.

Have you made up your mind?

Are they different or not at the end?

I would be grateful if you could tell me their d

hrsaneiI just posted the following phrases in the corpus of contemporary American English and got these results.

1. Scared to death (687 Examples )
2. Frightened to death (31 Examples)
3. Afraid to death (0 Examples)

The reason scared is more common than frightened might be more of a colocation here but afraid is completely wrong in that context

Is there anyone here who can list the difference ?

Thanks

http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/scared+to+death

http://idiom

Hi.

I have no problem with the above -mentioned phrases. Both of them are used widely in everyday English.

I asked the difference between these adjectives that you considered them synonymous.

I provided several counterexamples to prove that they are different.

You said they have different connotations, I am still waiting to tell me their difference in connotati