Question

Form an adjective from the following noun:
Boy
a. boyful
b. boyed
c. boyish
d. boyly

Answer 1

Hint: An adjective is a describing word. To form an adjective from a noun, we add the suffixes -ful, -ish, -ly, etc. For example, the noun fancy becomes an adjective when we add the suffix ‘-ful’. The adjective of fancy is fanciful.

Complete answer:
When we are talking about the noun boy, we mean a male child. When we add a suffix to it, we mean someone who is like a male child.
Let us look at the options to see which word makes sense as an adjective.

> Option a is boyful. There is no such word in the English Language. The adjectives with the suffix -ful are playful, fanciful, grateful, etc. but not boyful.

> Option b is boyed. Boyed is a wrong word. It makes no sense.

> Option c is boyish. When we say that someone is boyish, we mean he is like a small boy. The term boyish is used to refer to a person who is actually not a boy but is acting like a boy, i.e. childish.

> Option d is boyly. The term boyly also makes no sense. Thus, it cannot be the adjective of the noun boy.
Thus, as we can see, options a, b and d are words which do not exist in the English language. Therefore, the correct answer is boyish, that is, option c.

Note: If students are not sure of the answer, they can use the elimination method for this type of question. However, it is to be noted that though addition of certain suffixes do change nouns into adjectives, all such adjectives will not make sense, such as boyly, boyed, etc. Thus, it is necessary to have a good vocabulary and use the correct suffix with the noun to arrive at the correct adjective.