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Glite Dictionary
🛠️ To change slightly 🌤️ To soften 🔤 To add detail
to modify

to modify

16 4.5
Add a word or phrase that gives more information about another word
  • verb
  • /ˈmɒdɪfaɪ/
  • Specialized
translation icon : modificar
  • To clarify instructions, you can modify the wording of the sentence to make it easier to understand.
  • modifying adjective
  • noun is modified
  • genetically modified

So, for example, in the phrase Phas cunningus sweared the King's sword, the sense of sword is modified by our saying that it belongs to the king.

Examples

  • In grammar, an adverb can modify a verb by providing additional details about how, where, or when the action occurs.

  • Some of the survey questions are slightly modified to fit our sample.

    Academic text (2011)

  • We have modified a weather tower and successfully reversed the cooling process.

    The Colony (2013)

  • When the noun is modified, the 'w' is added only to the modifier.

    Academic text (2008)

  • So last night, as I was analyzing the droid's systems, I got to thinking maybe, just maybe, I could add a subroutine, modify its existing code.

    Juarez 2045 (2017)

  • "Grammatically, the adjective modifies 'es,' but semantically I perceive it as a zeugma modifying all three nominal verbs."

    Academic text (1995)

  • Each adjective in the sentence serves to modify the noun by giving more specific information about it.

Synonyms

to qualify
vsto modify
147 4.4

To make something more specific by adding details or limits

is a linguistic act that adds words or phrases to restrict meaning in sentences

Antonyms

to omit
66 3.4

Leave out something, for example a name, on purpose or by accident

How Restrictive

to restrict
361 3.1
to specify
118 3.5
to qualify
147 4.4
to modify
  • Specialized
16 4.5
to broaden
92 3.9

Surface Forms

modify infinitive
modified past
modified past participle
modifying present participle
modifies third person singular

Morphology

modify = modi + fy

The verb uses the productive English suffix '-fy' meaning 'make', but the stem 'modi-' is a Latin combining form (not a standalone English word), so learners cannot fully derive the meaning from familiar English base words.

Etymology

Modify comes from the Latin parts modus 'measure' and facere 'to make', and you can see the same idea in the word modifier. In grammar a modifier is a word that changes or limits the 'measure' of meaning, so to modify a noun or verb is to add words that make its meaning more specific.