Adjective vs. Characteristic — What's the Difference?

In linguistics, an adjective (abbreviated adj) is a word that modifies a noun or noun phrase or describes its referent. Its semantic role is to change information given by the noun.

Typical of a particular person, place, or thing

The part of speech that modifies a noun or other substantive by limiting, qualifying, or specifying and distinguished in English morphologically by one of several suffixes, such as -able, -ous, -er, and -est, or syntactically by position directly preceding a noun or nominal phrase.

A feature or quality belonging typically to a person, place, or thing and serving to identify them

Any of the words belonging to this part of speech, such as white in the phrase a white house.

The whole number or integral part of a logarithm, which gives the order of magnitude of the original number.

Adjectival

Being a feature that helps to distinguish a person or thing; distinctive

(Law) Specifying the processes by which rights are enforced, as opposed to the establishing of such rights; remedial

A feature that helps to identify, tell apart, or describe recognizably; a distinguishing mark or trait.

Not standing alone; derivative or dependent.

(Mathematics) The integral part of a logarithm as distinguished from the mantissa

(grammar) A word that modifies a noun or noun phrase or describes a noun’s referent.

(Mathematics) The least number of times the multiplicative identity in a ring needs to be added to itself to reach the additive identity, or, if the additive identity is never reached, zero. The integers have a characteristic of zero; the integers modulo 12 have a characteristic of 12.

(obsolete) A dependent; an accessory.

Being a distinguishing feature of a person or thing.

(grammar) Adjectival; pertaining to or functioning as an adjective.

A distinguishing feature of a person or thing.

(legal) Applying to methods of enforcement and rules of procedure.

(mathematics) The integer part of a logarithm.

Needing the use of a mordant to be made fast to that which is being dyed.

(nautical) The distinguishing features of a navigational light on a lighthouse etc by which it can be identified (colour, pattern of flashes etc.).

Incapable of independent function.

For a given field or ring, a natural number that is either the smallest positive number n such that n instances of the multiplicative identity (1) summed together yield the additive identity (0) or, if no such number exists, the number 0.

(transitive) To make an adjective of; to form or convert into an adjective.

Pertaining to, or serving to constitute, the character; showing the character, or distinctive qualities or traits, of a person or thing; peculiar; distinctive.

To characterize with an adjective; to describe by using an adjective.

A distinguishing trait, quality, or property; an element of character; that which characterized.

Added to a substantive as an attribute; of the nature of an adjunct; as, an adjective word or sentence.

The integral part (whether positive or negative) of a logarithm.

Not standing by itself; dependent.

A prominent aspect of something;

Relating to procedure.

A distinguishing quality

A word used with a noun, or substantive, to express a quality of the thing named, or something attributed to it, or to limit or define it, or to specify or describe a thing, as distinct from something else. Thus, in phrase, "a wise ruler," wise is the adjective, expressing a property of ruler.

The integer part (positive or negative) of the representation of a logarithm; in the expression log 643 = 2.808 the characteristic is 2

A dependent; an accessory.

Any measurable property of a device measured under closely specified conditions

To make an adjective of; to form or change into an adjective.

Typical or distinctive;

A word that expresses an attribute of something

The word class that qualifies nouns

Of or relating to or functioning as an adjective;

Applying to methods of enforcement and rules of procedure;