receptive

Etymology

From Late Middle English receptive, receptyue (“capable of receiving something; acting as a receptacle”), borrowed from Medieval Latin receptivus (“capable of receiving something”), from Latin receptus (“retaken, having been retaken; received, having been received”) + -īvus (suffix added to the perfect passive participial stems of verbs, forming a deverbal adjective meaning ‘doing; related to doing’). Receptus is the perfect passive participle of recipiō (“to regain possession, take back; to recapture; to receive; to accept, undertake”), from re- (prefix meaning ‘back, backwards; again’) + capiō (“to capture, catch, take; to take hold, take possession; to take on; to contain, hold; to occupy; to possess; to receive, take in; to comprehend, understand; to captivate, charm”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *kap-, *keh₂p- (“to hold; to seize”)).

adj

1. Capable of receiving something.
2. Ready to receive something, especially new concepts or ideas.
3. (botany) Of a female flower or gynoecium: ready for reproduction; fertile.
4. (neurology, psychology) Of, affecting, or pertaining to the understanding of language rather than its expression.
5. (zoology) Of a female animal (especially a mammal): prepared to mate; in heat, in oestrus.