Select the most appropriate ANTONYM of the given word. Affirmative

Correct — C. Affirmative means asserting that something is true, or expressing agreement — an affirmative answer is yes.

Its direct opposite is negative, the word English uses for the denying side of the same pair. They are a fixed antonym pair in grammar as well as in ordinary use, where every clause is either affirmative or negative. Option (c) is the match.

Why the others are wrong

• (a)
  Accession — Accession means formally joining or agreeing to something, as a country accedes to a treaty, and it also means coming into an office. Either sense sits on the agreeing side.
• (b)
  Sanction — Sanction as a noun means official approval or permission. That makes it an assent word, belonging with affirmative rather than against it.
• (d)
  Acquiescence — Acquiescence is quiet acceptance of what someone else proposes — agreement without protest. It is on the same side of the divide as affirmative.

Bare-word antonym items are often built as a three-to-one list: three options crowd around one sense and the fourth stands opposite them.

Here accession, sanction and acquiescence are all assent words — joining, approving, going along with. Once you see them as a family, the odd one out is doing the work of the antonym.

Affirmative and negative are also a technical pair in grammar, since a clause is one or the other. That pairing is what makes them the cleanest opposites on the list.

Key facts

• Affirmative means asserting or agreeing, and its grammatical opposite is negative.
• Acquiescence means accepting or consenting, usually without protest.
• Accession means formally agreeing to a treaty, or attaining an office.
• Sanction can mean official approval, while in the plural it can mean penalties.

Common traps

• Guessing accession from its look, as though it were built on access or exceed.
• Picking sanction on the penalty sense, which is still not an opposite of affirmative.

No directly related past PYQ was found.