Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
Definition: Reflective |
ReflectiveAdjective1. Persistently or morbidly thoughtful. 2. Capable of physically reflecting light or sound; "a reflective surface". 3. Devoted to matters of the mind; "the reflective type". Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "reflective" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1321. (references) |
| Domain | Definition |
Health | Capable of throwing back light, images, sound waves : reflecting. (references) |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
See:
In some British spellings, reflection may appear as reflexion.
- Reflection (mathematics)
- Reflection (optics)
- Reflection (computer science)
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Reflection."
| The following table is compiled from various sources, across various languages. When English abbreviations or acronyms come from a non-English source, this is noted. | |||
| Entry | Source | Expression | Field |
| REFLECT | English | Reflective expertise in knowledge-based systems | Computing, European Union |
Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |||
Synonyms: ReflectiveSynonyms: brooding (adj), broody (adj), contemplative (adj), meditative (adj), musing (adj), pensive (adj), pondering (adj), ruminative (adj). (additional references) |
| Antonym: nonreflective (adj). (additional references) |
| Context | Synonyms within Context (source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus). |
Thought | Adjective: thinking; Verb: thoughtful, pensive, meditative, reflective, museful, wistful, contemplative, speculative, deliberative, studious, sedate, introspective, Platonic, philosophical. |
| Source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus. | |
Crosswords: Reflective |
| English words defined with "reflective": Irreflective ♦ Muller, muser, musingly ♦ ponderer ♦ reflection, reflectively, ruminator. (references) |
| Specialty definitions using "reflective": ABCL/R, ABCL/R2 ♦ Concentrator Collector ♦ dopant ♦ electrophoretic display ♦ General Circulation Model ♦ MELDC, mirror coating ♦ ObjVlisp, OPTICAL-ELEMENT COATER ♦ Parabolic Dish, Parabolic Trough ♦ rat dance, reflective coating, Reflective Glass, Reflective Insulation ♦ software laser. (references) |
| Etymologies containing "reflective": skeptic. (references) |
| Domain | Title | ||
Books |
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Periodicals |
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Music |
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Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |||
| Thumbnail | Description & Credit | Thumbnail | Description & Credit |
 | Neir Negovanna and his wife Roseanna share a reflective moment. Credit: Paths Less Taken - NOAA at the Ends of the Earth. |  | Hurricane Alma off the west coast of Florida. Highly reflective water off west coast indicated by arrow. Probably caused by coastal waters being agitated by hurricane. NIMBUS II, pass 338, APT. From Picture of the Month, "Monthly Weather Review," August 1966. Credit: NOAA in Space. |
Source: pictures compiled by the editor from various references; see picture credits. | |||
 |  |
| "Palm Trees on side of Reflecti" by Chuck Reynolds Commentary: "Took this shot in Beverly Hills, california from across the street of this nice tall reflective building with complimenting palm trees to boot." | "Reflection" by Caron Wiedrick Commentary: "Reflective feature of the garden." |
Source: photographs selected by the editor, with permission from the photographers. | |
| Play | Caption |
 | An excerpt for piano which modulates in a style reflective of the Romantic era. |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Title | Author | Quote |
Life, the Universe and Everything | Douglas Adams | On the way back they sang a number of tuneful and reflective songs on the subjects of peace, justice, morality, culture, sport, family life and the obliteration of all other life forms |
Les Miserables | Hugo, Victor | A simple man would have been afraid on account of the twilight, and a reflective man on account of the club |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
| Subject | Topic | Quote |
Economic History | Chad | With French support, a reorganization of the armed forces was initiated early in 1991 with the goal is to reducing the armed forces to 25,000. An essential element of this effort was to make the ethnic composition of the armed forces reflective of the country as a whole. (references) |
Human Rights | South Africa | The ranks of judges, magistrates, senior counsels, and attorneys are more reflective of society than in the past, although they still fall far short of a representative composition. (references) |
Japan | The Government points out that the high percentage of confessions, like the high conviction rate, is reflective of a higher standard of evidence needed to bring about indictment in the judicial system. (references) | |
Source: compiled by the editor from ICON Group International, Inc.; see credits. | ||
| "Reflective" is generally used as an adjective (general or positive) -- approximately 99.08% of the time. "Reflective" is used about 325 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted) |
| Parts of Speech | Percent | Usage per 100 Million Words | Rank in English |
| Adjective (general or positive) | 99.08% | 322 | 16,053 |
| Noun (proper) | 0.92% | 3 | 202,518 |
| Total | 100.00% | 325 | N/A |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
Expressions using "reflective": reflective coating ♦ reflective insulant ♦ reflective jacket ♦ reflective power. Additional references. | |
| Hypenated Usage | |
Ending with "reflective": non-reflective, self-reflective. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com. |
| Language | Translations for "reflective"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | |
Albanian | reflektues, që i mendon gjërat, pasqyrues (ejector, mirror, rejector, reverberant, reverberating). (various references) | |
Arabic | مولع بالتأمل (meditative), متأمل (meditating, pensive, thinker), تأملي (contemplative, meditative, speculative), عاكس, إنعكاسي (reflexive). (various references) | |
Bulgarian | склонен към размисъл, разсъдъчен, отразяващ (specular), отразен (reflex, repercussive), обърнат назад (retroflex, retrograde, retrorse, retrospective), замислен (abstracted, broody, contemplative, grave, immersed in thought, intended, meditative, pensive, preoccupied, ruminant, thoughtful, wistful), прегънат назад. (various references) | |
Chinese | 反射性 (reflectivity). (various references) | |
Czech | zrcadlící. (various references) | |
Danish | reflekterende. (various references) | |
Dutch | reflectoor, reflectorisch. (various references) | |
Farsi | فکری (Cerebral, Intellectual, Mental, Notion), منعکس سازنده , وابسته بطرزتفکر, صیقلی (Glossy, Levigate, Shiny, Sleek, Slight, Smooth). (various references) | |
Finnish | miettivä (thoughtful), ajattelevainen (thinking, thoughtful). (various references) | |
French | réflecteur (reflector, reverberator), réfléchissant (reflecting), réfléchi (reflexive, reflexively), réflectif, songeur. (various references) | |
German | reflektiert (reflected, reflects, rejected), reflektierend (reflecting, reflectively). (various references) | |
Greek | σκεπτικόσ (broody, cogitative, contemplative, pensive, ruminant, ruminative, sceptic, sceptical, skeptical, speculative, thoughtful, wistful), συλλογιζόμενος (contemplative), στοχαστικόσ (contemplative, ruminative), ανακλαστικόσ (anaclastic). (various references) | |
Hebrew | רעיוני (conceptual, ideological, speculative). (various references) | |
Hungarian | visszaverő (reverberant), visszatükröző, visszaható (reactive, reflexive, retroactive), tükröző (specular), meggondolt (advised, mature, prudent, sober minded, temperate, thoughtful, well advised), körültekintő (astute, aware, chary, farseeing, prudent), gondolkodó (pensive, philosopher, reasonable, reasoning, thinker, thinking, thoughtful), gondolkodási, elmélkedő (contemplating, contemplative, meditative, pondering, ruminative, speculative). (various references) | |
Italian | riflessivo (reflexive, thoughtful), reflessivo. (various references) | |
Japanese Kanji | リビア山猫 (liberation, libido, Libyan wildcat, lift, liftback, living, living kitchen, living room, living room set, living stock, makeover, rebate, reboot, reference, reference guide, referencer, refinance, refine, reflation, reflect, reflection, reform instructor, reform plan, refrain, refresh, refreshment, repeat, repeater, replace, replicate, replication, reply, repression, reprint, reproduction, revision, rib, rib roast, rift, ripple, rivet, updating), 反射的 (reflecting, reflexive). (various references) | |
Japanese Katakana | リフレクティブ , はんしゃてき (reflecting, reflexive). (various references) | |
Korean | 사려깊은. (various references) | |
Manx | aavuillagh. (various references) | |
Pig Latin | eflectiveray.(various references) | |
Portuguese | reflexo (glance, glimmer, glimmering, glisten, ray, reflection, reflex, reflexion, reflexive, repercussion), reflexivo (reflexive, speculative), refletido (advised, collected, sedate, staid, thought about), recíproco (alternate, equivalent, mutual, reciprocal), que reflete, que dá reflexão. (various references) | |
Romanian | reflexiv (reflexive, thoughtful), referitor (towards), gândit (deliberately, politic, purposeful, thought-out), chibzuit (balanced, canny, cautious, circumspect, deliberate, discreet, economic, economical, judicious, measured, provident, providently, prudent, thought-out, thrifty, wary, wise), care reflectã, care rãsfrânge. (various references) | |
Russian | отражающий (repulsive). (various references) | |
Serbo-Croatian | zamišljen (abstracted, imaginary, notional, pensive, ruminant, ruminative, thoughtful, wistful), koji odražava, koji odbija. (various references) | |
Spanish | reflexivo (reflexive, ruminative), pensativo (digestible, drear, dreary, meditative, pensive, ruminative, thinkable, thoughtful, wistful), meditabundo (meditative, pensive, thoughtful), lustroso (glossy, lustrous), brillante (agleam, alight, bright, brilliant, dashing, diamond, flashing, gay, glaring, glazy, glistening, glossy, glowing, high, lurid, quicksilver, radiant, scintillant, scintillating, sheeny, shining, shiny, sparkling, starry, twinkling). (various references) | |
Swedish | reflekterande (deliberative), tankfull (contemplative, pensive, thoughtful, wistful), tänkande (imagining, meditation, thinking, thought). (various references) | |
Turkish | yansıtan, yansıtıcı (reflector, reverberator, specular), dalgın (absent, absent minded, abstracted, deep, distrait, dreamy, engrossed, far away, far off, faraway, glassy, lost, meditative, moony, pensive, plunged in thought, preoccupied, ruminant, ruminative, self-absorbed, stargazer, thoughtful, unheedful, vacant, vacuous, vague, wandering, wistful, woolgathering), düşünceli (abstracted, advised, circumspect, considerate, delicate, forethoughtful, meditative, minded, mindful, pensive, philosophic, philosophical, regardful, ruminant, ruminative, sophisticated, tactful, thoughtful, wistful, worried), aksettiren. (various references) | |
Turkmen | aяnadan. (various references) | |
Ukrainian | відбитий (echoic, reflex), відбивний, мислячий (cogitative, intellective, intellectual, reasoning, thinking). (various references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various translation references. | ||
| Language | Period | Translations |
| Sumerian | 3100 BCE-2500 BCE | tam. (various references) |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
Derivations | |
Words beginning with "reflective": reflectively, reflectiveness, reflectivenesses. (additional references) | |
Words ending with "reflective": antireflective, retroreflective, unreflective. (additional references) | |
| |
"Reflective" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: reflectives, reflecttive. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
| # of Phoneme Matches | Pronunciation | Word(s) rhyming with "reflective" (pronounced rufle"ktiv) |
| 6 | -l e" k t i v | collective, elective, selective. |
| 5 | -e" k t i v | affective, connective, corrective, defective, detective, directive, effective, ineffective, infective, introspective, invective, irrespective, objective, perspective, projective, prospective, protective, respective, retrospective, subjective. |
| 4 | -k t i v | active, addictive, adjective, attractive, conductive, constructive, counterproductive, destructive, distinctive, hyperactive, inactive, injunctive, instinctive, instructive, interactive, nonproductive, obstructive, octave, overactive, photoconductive, predictive, proactive, productive, radioactive, reactive, reconstructive, refractive, reproductive, restrictive, retroactive, seductive, superconductive, unattractive, unproductive, vindictive. |
| 3 | -t i v | accommodative, abortive, accumulative, accusative, acquisitive, adaptive, additive, administrative, adoptive, affirmative, alliterative, alternative, anticompetitive, appointive, appreciative, argumentative, assaultive, assertive, attentive, authoritative, automotive, captive, causative, cognitive, collaborative, combative, commemorative, communicative, comparative, competitive, congestive, consecutive, conservative, consultative, contemplative, contraceptive, cooperative, corruptive, creative, cumulative, curative, deceptive, decorative, definitive, degenerative, deliberative, demonstrative, derivative, descriptive, digestive, dilutive, diminutive, disincentive, disparages, dispositive, disruptive, dissipative, distributive, duplicative, elucidative, eruptive, evocative, executive, exhaustive, expletive, exploitative, exploitive, facultative, Federative, festive, figurative, fixative, formative, fugitive, furtive, generative, hypersensitive, illustrative, imaginative, imitative, imperative, inattentive, incentive, indicative, infinitive, informative, initiative, innovative, inoperative, inquisitive, insensitive, interpretive, intuitive, inventive, investigative, iterative, laxative, legislative, locomotive, lucrative, manipulative, meditative, motive, narrative, native, negative, neoconservative, nonautomotive, noncompetitive, noncumulative, nonexecutive, nonnative, normative, nutritive, operative, palliative, participative, pejorative, perceptive, plaintive, positive, preemptive, prerogative, preservative, presumptive, preventative, preventive, primitive, probative, prognosticative, prohibitive, provocative, punitive, putative, qualitative, quantitative, receptive, recuperative, redemptive, redistributive, regulative, rehabilitative, relative, remunerative, rep, repetitive, representative, restive, restorative, secretive, sedative, sensitive, speculative, stimulative, substantive, suggestive, superlative, supportive, talkative, tentative, ultraconservative, uncompetitive, uncooperative, unimaginative, uninformative, unreceptive, unrepresentative, vegetative, vituperative. |
Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits. | ||
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
| Words within the letters "c-e-e-e-f-i-l-r-t-v" | |
-2 letters: cleveite, elective, erectile, erective, fleecier. | |
-3 letters: evictee, fertile, fleecer, fleeter, leveret, receive, reelect, reflect, relieve, reticle, tiercel. | |
-4 letters: ceiler, cerite, clever, eelier, eviler, feeler, ferlie, fierce, filter, fleece, lefter, levier, liefer, liever, lifter, recite, refect, refeel, refelt, refile, reflet, releve, relict, relief, relive, retile, revile, telfer, tercel, tierce, trifle, veiler, verite. | |
-5 letters: citer, civet. | |
| Words containing the letters "c-e-e-e-f-i-l-r-t-v" | |
+2 letters: perfectively, reflectively, unreflective. | |
+4 letters: antireflective, reflectiveness, reflectivities. | |
+5 letters: retroreflective. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro. | |
| 1. Definition 2. Synonyms 3. Crosswords 4. Usage: Commercial | 5. Images: Slideshow 6. Images: Photo Album 7. Images: Digital Art 8. Sounds | 9. Quotations: Fiction 10. Quotations: Non-fiction 11. Usage Frequency 12. Expressions | 13. Expressions: Internet 14. Translations: Modern 15. Translations: Ancient 16. Abbreviations | 17. Acronyms 18. Derivations 19. Rhymes 20. Anagrams | 21. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
