Determining

How to spell determining

11 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce determining

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does determining mean?

1. verbIn the process of establishing, deciding, or working out something conclusively.
2. adjectiveHaving the decisive influence on an outcome.

Determining in a sentence

• verb

  The auditors are still determining the cause of the shortfall.

• adjective

  Cost was the determining factor in choosing the supplier.

• verb

  Determining the correct dosage requires careful calculation.

• adjective

  Her experience proved to be the determining element in the hiring decision.

Where does determining come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This is the present participle of 'determine', which traces back to the Latin verb determinare, meaning 'to set limits to' or 'to bound off'. That verb was built from the prefix de-, here acting as an intensifier meaning 'completely', and terminus, the Latin noun for a boundary marker, limit, or end; the very same root gives us 'terminal' and 'terminate'. The original sense was literally to fix the edges of something, and from that idea of marking off a fixed point grew the modern meaning of settling a question, fixing an outcome, or finding something out conclusively. English took the word through Old French determiner in the 1300s, and the abstract sense of resolving or deciding had become dominant by the late medieval period. The buried 'termin' root is a useful spelling cue: there are two letter 'e' sounds reduced to a schwa, so remembering the 'terminus' boundary helps fix the middle of the word.

How the word is built

• de- (down, completely)
• termin (boundary, limit, from Latin terminus)
• -ing (present participle/gerund suffix)