noun, verb ·Uncommon ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun

1. 1
   The act or habit of engaging in a reciprocal beneficial action. countable, uncountable

   "Near-synonym: logrolling"

2. 2
   The act or habit of engaging in a reciprocal beneficial action.; Such behavior that is corrupt. countable, often, uncountable

   "You have to "tip" the inspector if you want a license in this town. Too much backscratching around here!"

Verb

1. 1
   present participle and gerund of backscratch form-of, gerund, participle, present

Synonyms

All synonyms

abjectapple polishingback scratchingbarterbeggarlycrawling

Example

More examples

"She babysits the kids, and we mow her lawn. A little backscratching never hurt anybody!"

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.