Negativity

How to spell negativity

10 letters · 5 syllables

How to pronounce negativity

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does negativity mean?

1. nounA pessimistic, critical, or hostile attitude or quality.
2. nounThe state or property of carrying a negative electrical charge or value.

Negativity in a sentence

• The manager wanted to reduce the negativity in the team's morning meetings.

• The meter confirmed the negativity of the charge on the lower plate.

• Constant negativity from one colleague slowly drained the whole office.

• The equation accounts for the negativity of the result when the force reverses direction.

Where does negativity come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back to the Latin verb negare, which meant 'to deny' or 'to say no', itself built on the little Latin word neg, a negating element related to nec 'not'. From negare came the past participle stem negat-, which gave the Late Latin adjective negativus, meaning 'expressing denial'. English took the adjective 'negative' through Old French and Latin in the 1400s, first in the sense of denying or refusing something, and only later extended it to pessimism, electrical charge, and photographic images. The abstract noun 'negativity' was assembled in English by adding the suffix -ity, which turns an adjective into the name of a quality, so it literally means 'the quality of being negative'. The spelling trap sits in the unstressed middle: the schwa vowels in the -ativ-ity stretch sound vague, yet the word keeps the full neg + at + iv + ity skeleton from its Latin parent.

How the word is built

• negat- (from Latin negare: to deny)
• -ive (adjective suffix)
• -ity (noun-forming suffix: quality of)