Select the meaning that is nearest in meaning to the underlined word:
He is always anxious.
A) Worried
B) Dispassionate
C) Sluggish
D) Torpid

Hint: Synonyms are the words that give the same or similar meaning of the word or the phrase. For example, attractive, pretty, good-looking, charming all these words are synonyms of each other.

Complete answer:
The meaning of anxious is ‘feeling worried or showing worry or nervous.’ And we have to find the synonyms of this word out of the options given in the question. Synonyms are such words that can be used in place of each other. So, basically, we have to find such words from the options that can be meaningfully replaced.

Now let us analyze the given options:
Option A) Worried – the meaning of worried is ‘trouble about something or anxious or feeling troubled about’. Thus, this word is the synonym of the underlined word in the sentence – anxious. These two words can be meaningfully replacing each other because they both have the same or similar meaning. Thus, this is the correct answer.

Option B) Dispassionate – the meaning of dispassionate is ‘emotionless or non-emotional or unsentimental’. This word ‘dispassionate’ is not a synonym of the given word – anxious because they have different meanings and cannot be used in place of each other. Therefore, this is an incorrect answer.

Option C) Sluggish – the meaning of sluggish is ‘slow -moving or inactive or slow or depressed’. This word ‘sluggish’ is not a synonym of the given word – anxious because they have different meanings and cannot be used in place of each other. Therefore, this is an incorrect answer.

Option D) Torpid – the meaning of torpid is ‘lethargic or someone who is inactive or lazy or slow or inactive’. This word ‘torpid’ is not a synonym of the given word – anxious because they have different meanings and cannot be used in place of each other. But torpid is a synonym of the word sluggish because they have similar meaning. Thus, this is an incorrect answer.

Thus the correct answer is option ‘A’ i.e, Anxious – Worries.

Note: There are two words: antonyms and the synonyms. As we know, synonyms are words that have the same or exact meaning, on the other hand, antonyms are words that give opposite meanings. So, Option A is the most appropriate answer because worried and anxious have the same meaning and these two words can be used in place of each other and theonym of the word anxious is – carefree or unconcerned.