affordance.

A feature of an object or environment that enables a particular action for a user or organism.

Use it for

Words that belong together

• perceived affordance
• environmental affordance
• design affordance

On the page

The broad ledge offered the bird an affordance for landing.

Usage notes

Primary category: academic / formal / analytical. Lexical Type: Word. Forms: Singular affordance; plural affordances. Commonness: moderately common (editorial estimate; not a corpus frequency statistic). Legacy lexical fields mirror sense 1; numbered fields keep each relevant meaning separate. Research distinction: MW defines possible use or cues to use; actor-relative action-enabling formulation preserves core psychology/design usefulness without equating a visual cue with an actual action possibility. Writing functions: analysis, conceptual distinction.