commitment
Pluralcommitments
- 1A promise or agreement to do something at a future time.
The company honored its commitment to deliver the equipment by spring.
Her commitment to call every Sunday meant a lot to her grandmother.
Similarpromise, pledge, undertaking, obligation, vow
- 2The state of being emotionally or intellectually bound to a person, a cause, or a course of action.
Their commitment to each other survived years of long-distance separation.
Nothing could shake his commitment to the environmental movement.
Similardedication, devotion, loyalty, allegiance
- 3The state of being pledged or engaged, as when one's time, loyalty, or services are already promised.
His commitment to the firm prevented him from accepting outside consulting work.
Once under commitment to the publisher, she had to deliver the manuscript by June.
Similarobligation, contract
- 4The trait of showing sincerity and focused purpose in what one does.
Her commitment was obvious in the careful detail of every report.
Building a startup demands commitment that few people can sustain.
Similardedication, devotion, determination, resolve
Oppositeapathy, indifference
Note
A quality of character rather than a tie to something in particular. Even so, it often borrows the commitment to construction. Charles Hugh Smith, writing in 2020, says that Greek citizenship demanded "a commitment to serve the interests of the many via personal sacrifice". Without a complement, as in she shows real commitment, the word names the trait on its own. That bare use is the clearest sign that this sense, and not the bond, is meant.
- 5The act of being confined in an institution, such as a jail or a hospital for the mentally ill.
Her commitment to the psychiatric facility stretched into its second year.
During his commitment, he was allowed visitors only on Sundays.
Similarconfinement, detention
- 6The act of assuming a financial obligation that will come due at a future date.
The city's commitment to fund the stadium stretched over twenty years.
Before signing, review any commitment to future payments hidden in the contract.
Similarobligation, pledge
Note
Money narrows the promise. What is pledged is an obligation that falls due later, not simply an action to be done. The construction is often commitment to plus a verb (a commitment to fund, to repay). The plural is natural when obligations accumulate, as in the city's financial commitments. This is the costed case of the general promise, and it carries that sense's forward-looking time frame.
- 7The act or an instance of committing something or someone to another's charge, keeping, or trust.
The will provided for the commitment of the estate to a trustee until the heirs came of age.
Commitments of rare manuscripts to the archive's keeping are logged in a bound register.
Similarconsignment, entrustment, transfer
Note
Built from commit + -ment, this is the umbrella sense the official uses branch from, with commit meaning to hand over. Sending a bill to committee and consigning someone to prison are both this act carried out by an authority. Keep it apart from the sense of a pledge: here something is entrusted to another rather than undertaken oneself, and the pattern is commitment of a thing to a keeper.
- 8The official act of consigning a person to prison or to a mental health institution.
The court ordered the defendant's commitment to a federal correctional facility.
Two doctors certified the paperwork before her commitment to the psychiatric ward could proceed.
Similarcommittal, confinement
Note
Here a person, rather than a bill, is placed in official keeping. The idea of entrusting is the same one behind the legislative sense. This meaning names the decision and its authority, not the stay that follows. Keep it apart from the confinement itself. A phrase like her commitment to the ward can point to either the order or the time spent inside, so the surrounding words have to make clear which is meant.
- 9The act of perpetrating something, such as a crime or a mistake.
Investigators traced the commitment of the fraud to a single employee.
Repeated commitment of the same error pointed to a flaw in the training program.
Similarcommission, perpetration
Less common meaning
- 10The assignment of a proposed law to a legislative committee so its members can examine it.
Practice
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Origin
Formed from the verb "commit" combined with the suffix "-ment".