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compliant

used in a sentence
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)
  • He hated running, but the applause was intoxicating, and the prospect of more was just enough incentive to keep him marginally compliant.
    Laura Hillenbrand  --  Unbroken
    • compliant = conforming to rules and instructions
  • They're ashamed of having come from noncompliant families.
    Orson Scott Card  --  Ender's Game
    • 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.)
  • 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
    • (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.)
  • State Noncompliance Leads to Civil War
    Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, & John Jay  --  The Federalist Papers — Modern English Edition 2
    • (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.)
  • 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
    • (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.)
  • 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
    • (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.)
  • One of our shooters was about to cap him for noncompliance.
    Howard E. Wasdin & Stephen Templin  --  I Am a Seal Team Six Warrior
    • (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.)
  • 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
    • (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.)
  • 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
(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.)

Dictionary / pronunciation — Google®Dictionary list — Onelook.com®
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
    • compliant = tending to do what others want
  • They get a ready supply of compliant low-cost workers.
    Sonia Nazario  --  Enrique's Journey
    • compliant = tending to do what others (their bosses) want
  • ...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
    • compliant = likely to do what others (bosses) wanted
  • He realized that his mother wasn't the compliant woman he had known before.
    Robert Cormier  --  I Am the Cheese
    • compliant = having a tendency to obey rules or do what others want
  • Still, to be too compliant may arouse suspicion as well.
    Suzanne Collins  --  Mockingjay
    • compliant = having a tendency to obey rules or do what others want
  • 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
    • compliant = tending to do what others (Washington) wanted
  • Unlike her compliant older brother, Sonia, seven months old, refuses all the food.
    Jhumpa Lahiri  --  The Namesake
    • compliant = doing what others want
  • 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
    • compliant = tending to do what others want
  • The problems were compliant, pliable; they yielded to my manipulations, forming into solutions, one after the other.
    Tara Westover  --  Educated
compliant = doing what others want

Dictionary / pronunciation — Google®Dictionary list — Onelook.com®
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.
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