2 meanings
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1 —as in:
compliant with the law
Definition
conforming to rules- The company was fined for not being regulation 4.3 compliant.
compliant = conforming to rules
Other Uses (with this meaning)
- They're ashamed of having come from noncompliant families.Orson Scott Card -- Ender's Game
- The whitecoat looked surprised at my noncompliance-obviously he hadn't read all of our case notes.James Patterson -- Saving the World and Other Extreme Sports
- State Noncompliance Leads to Civil WarAlexander Hamilton, James Madison, & John Jay -- The Federalist Papers — Modern English Edition 2
- Along the way doctors had accused her of "noncompliance," and her son had died of tb, more than likely from a strain of the disease that he'd caught from her.Tracy Kidder -- Mountains Beyond Mountains
- He'd already ruled out noncompliance, he felt, and poor drug quality couldn't be blamed—international experts had certified the drugs' efficacy.Tracy Kidder -- Mountains Beyond Mountains
- One of our shooters was about to cap him for noncompliance.Howard E. Wasdin & Stephen Templin -- I Am a Seal Team Six Warrior
- 9 However, there is an important difference between NONCOMPLIANCE, and DIRECT and ACTIVE RESISTANCE.Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, & John Jay -- The Federalist Papers — Modern English Edition 2
- But you're also a badge of cowardice, because they dare not go further and practice the noncompliance they still feel is right.Orson Scott Card -- Ender's Game
- In those trials it had seemed that most treatment failures arose because of patients' noncompliance—because they hadn't taken all their pills, not because they were infected with highly drug-resistant strains.Tracy Kidder -- Mountains Beyond Mountains
noncompliant = not conforming to rules
(Editor's note: The prefix "non-" in noncompliant means not and reverses the meaning of compliant. This is the same pattern you see in words like nonfat, nonfiction, and nonprofit.)
(Editor's note: The prefix "non-" in noncompliance means not and reverses the meaning of compliance. This is the same pattern you see in words like nonfat, nonfiction, and nonprofit.)
(Editor's note: The prefix "non-" in noncompliance means not and reverses the meaning of compliance. This is the same pattern you see in words like nonfat, nonfiction, and nonprofit.)
(Editor's note: The prefix "non-" in noncompliance means not and reverses the meaning of compliance. This is the same pattern you see in words like nonfat, nonfiction, and nonprofit.)
(Editor's note: The prefix "non-" in noncompliance means not and reverses the meaning of compliance. This is the same pattern you see in words like nonfat, nonfiction, and nonprofit.)
(Editor's note: The prefix "non-" in noncompliance means not and reverses the meaning of compliance. This is the same pattern you see in words like nonfat, nonfiction, and nonprofit.)
(Editor's note: The prefix "non-" in noncompliance means not and reverses the meaning of compliance. This is the same pattern you see in words like nonfat, nonfiction, and nonprofit.)
(Editor's note: The prefix "non-" in noncompliance means not and reverses the meaning of compliance. This is the same pattern you see in words like nonfat, nonfiction, and nonprofit.)
(Editor's note: The prefix "non-" in noncompliance means not and reverses the meaning of compliance. This is the same pattern you see in words like nonfat, nonfiction, and nonprofit.)
2 —as in:
a compliant individual
Definition
to obey rules or do what others want- When the President is popular, the legislature tends to be compliant.
compliant = obeying rules or doing what others want
Other Uses (with this meaning)
- Her temperament was compliant.Tara Westover -- Educated
- They get a ready supply of compliant low-cost workers.Sonia Nazario -- Enrique's Journey
- ...they were more compliant than American workers, less likely to file workers' compensation claims or to support union organizing drives.Warren St. John -- Outcasts United
- He realized that his mother wasn't the compliant woman he had known before.Robert Cormier -- I Am the Cheese
- Still, to be too compliant may arouse suspicion as well.Suzanne Collins -- Mockingjay
- Washington, with the help of a generally compliant mainstream American press, was busily denouncing Aristide, even manufacturing lies about him,Tracy Kidder -- Mountains Beyond Mountains
- Unlike her compliant older brother, Sonia, seven months old, refuses all the food.Jhumpa Lahiri -- The Namesake
- She had always been the docile middle child, used to following the lead. Next to an alto she sang alto, by a soprano, soprano. Miss Sonrisa, cheerful, compliant. Her life had gotten bound up with a domineering man, and so she shrank from the challenge her sisters were giving her.Julia Alvarez -- In the Time of the Butterflies
- The problems were compliant, pliable; they yielded to my manipulations, forming into solutions, one after the other.Tara Westover -- Educated
compliant = tending to do what others want
compliant = tending to do what others (their bosses) want
compliant = likely to do what others (bosses) wanted
compliant = having a tendency to obey rules or do what others want
compliant = having a tendency to obey rules or do what others want
compliant = tending to do what others (Washington) wanted
compliant = doing what others want
compliant = tending to do what others want
compliant = doing what others want
Less commonly:
Compliance, the noun form, is seen 4 times as often as the verb, but is only mentioned explicitly on 1/4 as many SAT review lists.