prior knowledge

noun

Knowledge of a set of circumstances sufficient to make actions based on those circumstances wrongful.

“All our policies require a declaration of no prior knowledge as a matter of routine.”

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Meanings

nounprior knowledge (uncountable)
  1. uncountablecriminal lawKnowledge of a set of circumstances sufficient to make actions based on those circumstances wrongful.

    The defendant was convicted because the prosecutor proved the defendant's prior knowledge of the victim's particular vulnerability.

  2. uncountablebusinessPrior to the inception of an insurance policy, knowledge of specific extant circumstances that could reasonably give rise to a claim under that policy.

    All our policies require a declaration of no prior knowledge as a matter of routine.

  3. uncountableUsed other than figuratively or idiomatically: see prior, knowledge.

    I had no prior knowledge of linguistics, but that didn't stop me from writing a dictionary.

    3 more examples

    The impact of prior knowledge on the acquisition of knowledge is certanly not a new finding.

    1995, Jan Elen, Blocks on the Road to Instructional Design Prescriptions, →ISBN, page 217

    Most constructivist-inspired instruction attempts to make contact with students' prior knowledge so students will learn better.

    2007, Marsha Lovett, Priti Shah, Thinking with Data, →ISBN, page 319

    Half the students in the study were encouraged to activate prior knowledge (i.e., they wrote down everything they knew about the topic before reading the relevant passage), and half read the to-be-acquired content without opportunity for activation.

    2012, Wolfgang Schneider, Franz E. Weinert, Interactions Among Aptitudes, Strategies, and knowledge in Cognitive Performance, →ISBN

Translations

Finnish tietoisuus
  • tietoisuus(law) knowledge of circumstances
Swedish förkunskap
  • förkunskap(law) knowledge of circumstances
Cite this entry
APA

prior knowledge. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 2, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/prior%20knowledge

MLA

“prior knowledge.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/prior%20knowledge. Accessed November 2, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “prior knowledge,” accessed November 2, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/prior%20knowledge.

Source: prior knowledge on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.