Intensive

:dablink|In physics, intensive may refer to an intensive quantity.

In grammar, an intensive form of a word is one which denotes stronger or more forceful action as compared with the root on which the intensive is built. Intensives are usually lexical formations, but there may be a regular process for forming intensives from a base root. Intensive formations, for example, existed in Proto-Indo-European, and in many of the Semitic languages.

In Classical Arabic, Form II ("faʿʿal-a") can form intensives, in addition to causatives; while form IV ("'afʿal-a") forms only causitives. Hebrew has a similar distinction between the "pi`el" (intensive) and "hiph`il" (causative) binyans. Some Germanic languages have intensive prefixes or particles that can be attached to verbs; consider German "zer-", which adds the meaning of "... into pieces", e.g. "reißen" "to rip" "zerreißen" "to rip to pieces".

Latin had verbal prefixes "e-" and "per-" that could be more or less freely added onto any verb and variously added such meanings as "to put a great deal of effort into doing something". When the same prefixes ("per" especially) were added onto adjectives, the resulting meaning was "very X" or "extremely X".