distributive

dis·tribu·tive (di strib′yo̵̅o̅ tiv′, -yo̵ot iv)

adjective

distributing or tending to distribute
relating to distribution
Gram. referring individually to all members of a group “each” and “either” are distributive words
Math. of or having to do with a property, law, or principle in which the relationship between two combined operations, as multiplication and addition or multiplication and subtraction, is such that the results are the same whether the first operation is done on each item of a set and then combined or done once on the items in the set that have already been combined (Ex.: a(b + c) = ab + ac)

Etymology: ME & OFr distributif < LL distributivus

noun

a distributive word or expression

dis·trib′u·tively adverb

Adjective modifier

right: A distributive quasigroup is a quasigroup that is both left and right distributive.

Modifies a noun

justice: The others, however, chose the road of distributive justice.
share: Instead, members must include in their Arkansas taxable adjusted gross income their distributive share of LLC income.
trade: Much valuable information on the London distributive trades is also emerging from analysis of the CCP database.
law: Activity Quite often it is necessary to use the distributive law to solve these problems.
system: The research work focuses on understanding from a Human Factors and Operations Management perspective the UK railways as a complex distributive engineering system.
effect: Within a country, the national government can always redistribute to offset distributive effects of other policies.

Modifying Another Word

not: Read Math Spoken Here, featuring the essays " Most Operations Are Not Distributive, " " So, What's A Fraction?

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