interactive

Pluralinteractives

1. 1
   adjective

   Designed so that the user can take part and receive responses, rather than only receiving information.

   Like a conversation, where each side responds, instead of a lecture you only listen to.

   The museum's interactive display invites visitors to mix colors on a touchscreen.

   Designers made the tutorial interactive so learners type answers and get instant feedback.

   Similarhands-on, participatory

   Oppositepassive, static

   Note

   In computing, the two-way exchange of the general sense narrows to one between a person and a system: the user acts and the program answers. An interactive digital map is the typical case. Zooming and panning are things you do, and the map redraws in response. The adjective usually stands before its noun, as in interactive map, interactive display or interactive tutorial.

2. 2
   adjective

   Acting on or affecting one another; each part influences and responds to the others.

   The interactive relationship between predator and prey shapes both populations over time.

   Climate and vegetation are deeply interactive, each influencing the other across the seasons.

   Similarinterdependent, reciprocal, interrelated

   Oppositeindependent

   Note

   The word is built in plain sight from inter- and active: the action runs between the parties rather than from one to the other. It is not limited to machines. In interactive teaching methods, teacher and students shape each other's work, much as two interactive systems shape each other's behavior. Reciprocity is the test: if only one side acts, the word does not fit.

3. 3
   nouncountable

   A display feature, such as one in a museum, that visitors can engage with directly.

   The gallery's newest interactive invites visitors to assemble a virtual skeleton bone by bone.

   Curators added several interactives to help children explore the exhibit through play.

   Note

   Here the adjective has become a noun, at home in exhibition halls and shows for children. It counts like any ordinary noun (one interactive, several interactives) and sits naturally in the plural beside other exhibit elements. Laurel Graeber, writing in the New York Times in 2009, lists computer interactives alongside animation, models and live parakeets.

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