stick to

present singular third person sticks to · participle present sticking to · participle past stuck to · past stuck to

1. To persist; to continue (to use, do, etc.)

   If you stick to your studies, you will continue to improve.

   4 more examples

   I have seen all the fancy electric toothbrushes, but I'm going to stick to the old-fashioned kind.

   Then Raa made him face in turn north, east, and west, and swear that the woman with him was his sister. The man stuck to it that she was his indeed his sister. Rama next tuned him to the south, whereupon the man contradicted his former statement and said that the woman was his wife.

   1918, James George Frazer, Folk-Lore In The Old Testament, volume 1, page 194

   When I did newspaper work in the 1950s I always found it hard to initiate criticism of a person. Now, in the late 1970s, I suddenly find it has become hard to praise a person. Take, for example, the case of Liu Jie, an inspector of the neighborhood registry in the Daxing’anling district of Heilongjiang, who was praised in the press for sticking to principles. She also had the support of the Provincial Party Committee. But it was precisely the commendation of the Party newspaper that brought calamity upon her, and the support of the provincial leadership was of no use in breaking the siege that befell her.

   2006 [1979 November 9], Binyan Liu, “Listen Carefully to the Voice of the People”, in Kyna Rubin, Perry Link, transl., edited by Perry Link, Two Kinds of Truth: Stories and Reportage from China, Indiana University Press, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 34

   What I get from work makes me a better mother, and what I get from being a mother makes me a better journalist. At least that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

   2007, Amanda Lamb, Smotherhood: Wickedly Funny Confessions from the Early Years

2. To follow and remain close to.

   The suspect doubled back through an alley, but the detective stuck to him.

3. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see stick, to.