määrittelevät

Määrittelevät is a Finnish verb form meaning "they define" or "they specify." It is the present tense, third-person plural form of the verb määritellä, whose infinitive is määritellä. The form is used when the subject of the sentence is plural and performs the action of defining or specifying.

In usage, määrittelevät conveys the act of determining limits, characteristics, or boundaries, and it commonly appears in academic, legal, technical, or descriptive texts. It can govern objects such as concepts, criteria, terms, or procedures, for example when stating that certain rules or results define how a process operates or how concepts are understood. The sense can encompass both explicit definition and the act of framing or delimiting a discussion.

Examples:

- Tutkimuksen tulokset määrittelevät käsitteiden rajan. (The study results define the boundary of the concepts.)

- Lait ja säännöt määrittelevät, miten ohjelmisto toimii. (Laws and rules define how the software operates.)

- Keskustelun kysymykset määrittelevät keskustelun suunnan. (The questions of the discussion define its direction.)

Related forms include the infinitive määritellä (to define), the singular present tense määrittelee (he/she defines), and the present participle muodossa määrittelevä (defining). The word is conceptually linked to definitions and definitional terminology, with etymology typically traced to the root concept of specifying or determining boundaries.