Which of the following is considered a derivational suffix?

Which of the following is considered a derivational suffix?

• A. -ful
• B. -ed
• C. -s
• D. -est

Answer: (A)

Derivational suffixes create new words and often change the part of speech. The suffix -ful attaches to a noun such as hope to form the adjective hopeful, meaning “full of hope.” It adds a new meaning and a different word class, which is the hallmark of derivation. The other suffixes here—ed, s, and est—are inflectional. They don’t create new words; they add grammatical information: -ed marks past tense or past participle (walked), -s marks plural or third-person singular (cats, runs), and -est marks the superlative (tallest). So -ful is the derivational suffix.

Derivational suffixes create new words and often change the part of speech. The suffix -ful attaches to a noun such as hope to form the adjective hopeful, meaning “full of hope.” It adds a new meaning and a different word class, which is the hallmark of derivation. The other suffixes here—ed, s, and est—are inflectional. They don’t create new words; they add grammatical information: -ed marks past tense or past participle (walked), -s marks plural or third-person singular (cats, runs), and -est marks the superlative (tallest). So -ful is the derivational suffix.