formative: Meaning and Definition of

form•a•tive

1. giving form or shape; forming; shaping; fashioning; molding: a formative process in manufacturing.
2. pertaining to formation or development: a child's most formative years.
3. formative tissue.
1. capable of developing new cells or tissue by cell division and differentiation:formative tissue.
2. concerned with the formation of an embryo, organ, or the like.
4. pertaining to a formative.

1. a derivational affix, particularly one that determines the part of speech of the derived word, as -ness, in loudness, hardness, etc.
2. (in generative grammar) any element, as a word, affix, or inflectional ending, functioning as a minimal syntactic unit that can be used in forming larger constructions.