satisfying

Etymology

From satisfy + -ing.

adj

1. That satisfies, gratifies or pleases; that removes any feeling of lack.
   As in much of biology, the most satisfying truths in ecology derive from manipulative experimentation. Tinker with nature and quantify how it responds. 2012-01, Robert M. Pringle, “How to Be Manipulative”, in American Scientist, volume 100, number 1, archived from the original on 2013-10-03, page 31
2. Pleasing to certain sensory channels in neurocognition, especially auditory and tactile ones synesthetically via ASMR.
   If my girls like something I cooked for them, they don’t exclaim that it is "satisfying." Rather, the kids seem to be using the word this way to refer not to all kinds of sensory experience, but to a subset of them, more often involving sound and touch than sight, smell or taste. And this is not random. […] Quite unconsciously, American kids are transforming the word "satisfying" into a way of being more Jahai-like, more specific, about sensation. Their "Definition 2" usage is giving overt expression to what the pleasures of hearing the gurgling of a bathtub draining and the feeling of popping Bubble Wrap have in common. You may have to work to wrap your head around the likeness between those two sensations, but it makes sense that a language, in this case, English, would develop a way of corralling auditory and tactile satisfaction off from the visual, olfactory and gustatory. 2022-07-30, John McWhorter, “Language Evolves Right Before Our Ears. It's Very 'Satisfying'”, in New York Times, archived from the original on 2022-07-31

verb

1. present participle and gerund of satisfy