引诱

• Pinyin: yǐn yòu
• Hanzi breakdown: 引 = 弓 + 丨 (bow + arrow — to lead, to draw); 诱 = 言 + 秀 (speech + elegant/flourishing — to tempt through attractive words)

Meaning

To lure; to entice; to tempt. Drawing someone toward something through attraction, often with a negative connotation of deception or moral risk.

Stronger and more negative than 吸引 (to attract) — 引诱 implies intentional enticement that may lead someone astray, into danger, or against their better judgement. Used in legal (诱骗未成年人), moral, and psychological contexts. Common in warnings and critical commentary.

Examples

1. 诈骗团伙常以高额回报为诱饵引诱受害者转账，手法也随社交媒体普及而不断变化。 Fraud rings often use high returns as bait to lure victims into transferring money, and their methods keep changing as social media spreads.
2. 这款游戏被批评刻意用心理机制引诱玩家持续付费。 This game was criticised for deliberately using psychological mechanisms to lure players into paying continuously.
3. 嫌疑人多次以高薪兼职为名，引诱在校大学生提供身份信息并出售牟利。 The suspect repeatedly posed as a high-paying part-time recruiter, luring university students into providing identity information and selling it for profit.

Usage Guide

Context: legal, social commentary, psychology, media

Tone: critical

Do Say

• 监管部门已调查部分网贷平台夸大收益、隐瞒风险引诱投资者买高风险理财的行为。(Regulators have investigated some online lending platforms for exaggerating returns and concealing risks to lure investors into buying high-risk wealth products.)
• 研究表明，过度奖励和制造稀缺感，是平台引诱用户延长使用时长的两种手段。(Research shows that excessive rewards and manufactured scarcity are two ways platforms lure users into spending more time on them.)

Don't Say

• 这幅画引诱了我的注意力 — 引诱 implies intentional temptation with a morally negative dimension; for neutral attraction use 吸引了我的注意; 引诱 should be reserved for contexts where there is deliberate enticement toward potential harm or moral compromise

Origin & History

引 (to draw/lead — 弓 bow + 丨 arrow drawn back) + 诱 (to tempt/lure — 言 speech/persuasion + 秀 elegant/attractive); together: 'to draw someone in through persuasive enticement'

Cultural Context

Era: Modern

Generation: All ages

Social background: Universal