lean toward

lean toward (someone or something)

1. To bend, tilt, or incline in the direction of someone or something. I tried leaning toward the door to hear what they were talking about in the other room. She leaned toward Tom and whispered something in his ear.
2. To have a slight preference for or inclination toward someone, something, or some action. Usually used in a continuous tense. We're leaning toward keeping the company privately held. I'm leaning toward a laptop rather than a desktop computer. We're still leaning toward Jeff, but we still have a few more people to interview for the job.
See also: lean, toward
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms.

lean toward someone or something

 
1. to incline toward someone or something. Tom is leaning toward Randy. I think he is going to fall on him. The tree is leaning toward the edge of the cliff. It will fall eventually.
2. to tend to favor [choosing] someone or something. lam leaning toward Sarah as the new committee head. I'm leaning toward a new committee.
See also: lean, toward
McGraw-Hill Dictionary of American Idioms and Phrasal Verbs.
See also:
  • lean toward (someone or something)
  • lean toward doing
  • sway toward (something)
  • slant toward
  • slant toward (someone or something)
  • fall toward
  • fall toward (something)
  • lean in
  • lean out (of something)
  • lean out of
References in periodicals archive
About 69% of Republicans and 69% of independents who lean toward the Republicans would like to see PPACA opponents continue to fight the law.
PPACA: The Court of Public Opinion
Ideologically, Taiwan's public appears split between those who lean away from China and seek to safeguard the island's de facto sovereignty and those who lean toward China and eventual unification, be it economic or political.
Hong Kong mogul nearing deal to buy Taiwan media: sources
But some others on the editorial staff, concerned about what might happen to innocent people in Iraq if the United States just up and left, lean toward Gustafson's view, so we wanted to air it out.
Airing it out
And when we, as preachers, dare to lean toward our congregation with stories of what is private and personal, our congregants will lean toward us as well.
Confessions of a novice Baptist preacher
The Senate is likely to approve changes that lean toward Raines' call to address safety concerns while retaining Fannie's ability to offer new housing programs.
Fannie Mae faces off with federal regulators
Various parts of past Supreme Court cases lean toward Hiibel's side of the argument, but it's not clear whether he'll prevail.
Your papers, please: ID demands DOA?
The choice of the word paraclete seems also to lean toward the gift of a strong and multifaceted God available to us as individuals and communities in our times of trial.
The Holy Trinity: June 6, 2004
Non-conventional lenders traditionally fill the gap when commercial banks lean toward a conservative tightening of underwriting standards.
A changing arena for real estate finance
* The more you lean toward dependence on email for communications, the worse people will become at understanding what you have written.
Why things go wrong. (Blowfish)
They also double as eyes, so that many of the paintings seem to watch us watching them, Murray's table-and-cup combinations in particular lean toward anthropomorphism, most explicitly in Inner Life, 2000, where a disk at the picture's top is surely a head, and arms cross the table to encircle an enormous blue cup with a black interior--but the head intermixes with a chair back, and the arms run under and through the table as well as over it, so that we are seeing not so much a figure at a table as a figure that is a table.
Elizabeth Murray. (Reviews)
If you still subscribe to the Darwinian notion of sexual competition, which holds that only males are promiscuous by nature while females lean toward monogamy, then you are woefully behind the advances in the field of sexual physiology and selection, Birkhead believes.
Promiscuity: An Evolutionary History of Sperm Competition
While his own tastes lean toward work on the cutting edge, "that place where you're not quite sure what to call it," Sefton also hopes to be able to bring to Los Angeles some of his favorite international choreographers and companies--Lucinda Childs, Teshe Gawara, dumb type, Alain Platel, Les Ballets C de la B, and the British company Cholmondeleys, with whom he has worked in the past.
NEW PERFORMING ARTS PRESENTER MAKES BIG PLANS IN L.A
DAVE: Personally, I would lean toward something more private.
GUYS Q & A
Company A might lean toward more flexible underwriting.
Sharing Knowledge Pays Off
Such evidence includes: a forward lean toward the speaker rather than a too casual/dismissive lean away from a speaker; maintenance of eye contact; and a lack of dismissive or inattentive fidgeting.
Listening: A Vital Skill