appetitive.

Relating to desire for, or movement toward, something rewarding.

Use it for

Words that belong together

• appetitive motivation
• appetitive behavior

On the page

The experiment contrasted appetitive motivation with avoidance.

Usage notes

Primary category: psychology / human behavior. Forms: Normally non-gradable; no ordinary comparative or superlative. Legacy lexical fields mirror sense 1 only. Use numbered sense fields for all meanings. Established modern English lexical item. No separate regional spelling or grammatical inflection entry. Writing functions: character, behavior. Commonness: moderately common.