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associative

adjective

Simple meaning

Having or causing or resulting from bringing ideas or events together in memory or imagination.

Pronunciation

Say it like this:

uhsohsheeaytiv

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US device voice
IPA pronunciation (US)

əˈsoʊʃieɪtɪv

This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.

IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.

Word Review

Definition

Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.

adjective

  1. Pertaining to, resulting from, or characterised by association; capable of associating; tending to associate or unite.

  2. Characterized by or causing or resulting from the process of bringing ideas or events together in memory or imagination

  3. algebraof a binary operator *

    Such that, for any operands a,b and c, (a*b)*c=a*(b*c); (of a ring, etc.) whose multiplication operation is associative.

  4. computing

    Addressable by a key more complex than an integer index.

Word at a Glance

Difficulty
C1 · Advanced (estimated)
Frequency
Uncommon
Typical Use
Primarily written

Word Aura™

How this word commonly comes across.

Aura for this meaning

This meaning: Pertaining to, resulting from, or characterised by association; capable of associating; tending to associate or unite.

Used this way, associative is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It usually sounds natural in a wide range of settings.

Emotional tone
Neutral
Formality
Neutral
Intensity
Not strongly marked
How common
Moderately common
Connotation
No strong connotation
Usage feel
Neutral and straightforward

Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.

More ways to use associative

  • “Associative learning.”adjective

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Common Patterns and Combinations

How this word naturally appears with others.

associative memoryassociative arrayassociative learningassociative propertyassociative lawassociative strengthassociative networkassociative process

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Word Family

Related forms, grouped by how they connect.

Compound terms

Established multiword terms.

  • associative aphasianounCompound term

    Aphasia in which the lesion is assumed to be in the association tracts connecting the various language centers in the brain.

More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin

Antonyms

Sense: pertaining to or resulting from

nonassociativeRare

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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.