visive

Visive is an English adjective meaning relating to vision or sight. It is a rare term in everyday usage, with visual or vision-related language more common in modern English. When it appears, it often serves to emphasize the visual modality in contrast with other senses.

In scholarly writing, visive is used to refer to processes, stimuli, or representations processed through the visual system. It is typically contrasted with other sensory modalities such as auditive (hearing) or haptic (touch), especially in discussions of sensory perception, multisensory integration, or cognitive processing of sensory information.

Etymology and usage notes: the word derives from Latin visus, meaning sight, related to videre, to see. Although visive shares a root with visual, it remains less frequent as a direct synonym and is more likely to be encountered in technical or interdisciplinary contexts or in older literature.

Examples of use may include phrases like visive processing, visive attention, or visive cues in discussions that aim to distinguish visual modality from other sensory channels. Its use is largely confined to specialized research or theoretical writing rather than general prose.

See also: visual, vision, visual perception, sensory modality, perceptual psychology, multisensory processing.