vegetative
pronunciation
How to pronounce vegetative in British English:
UK [ˈvedʒɪtətɪv]
How to pronounce vegetative in American English:
US [ˈvedʒɪteɪtɪv]
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- Adjective:
- of or relating to an activity that is passive and monotonous
- used of involuntary bodily functions
- (of reproduction) characterized by asexual processes
- composed of vegetation or plants
Word Origin
- vegetative (adj.)
- late 14c., "endowed with the power of growth," from Old French vegetatif "(naturally) growing," from Medieval Latin vegetativus, from vegetat-, past participle stem of vegetare (see vegetable (adj.)). Middle English transferred sense was "characterized by growth." Modern pathological sense of "brain-dead, lacking intellectual activity, mentally inert" is from 1893, via notion of having only such functions which perform involuntarily or unconsciously and thus are likened to the processes of vegetable growth.
Example
- 1. He is slowly regressing into a vegetative state .
- 2. The gfmc says that more than 15 million hectares of forest and vegetative land have burned in fires in the russian federation already this year .
- 3. " If it 's not on the menu , it 's not going to eat it , " he told fox news . " There are certain signatures form different kinds of materials that would distinguish vegetative biomass from other material . "
- 4. Doctors presumed he was in a vegetative state following a near-fatal car crash in 1983 .
- 5. Modern medicine , however , has created a third option , the persistent vegetative state .