Definition of "formative" in English

adjective

1. Capable of forming something.

2. Of or pertaining to the formation and subsequent growth of something.

   • My formative years were spent in an inner city.

3. (education) Of a form of assessment: used to guide learning rather than to quantify educational outcomes.

noun

1. A thing which causes formation to occur.

2. A language unit, typically a morph, that has a morphological function (that is, forming a word from a root or another word).

3. Synonym of derivative (“a word that derives from another one”).