punitive.

Intended to punish rather than simply correct or compensate.

Use it for

Words that belong together

• punitive measures
• punitive damages

On the page

The committee rejected punitive measures against students who had reported the error.

Usage notes

Primary category: academic / formal. 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. Commonness: moderately common.