This is the second in our series of articles on 1,000 useful words for IELTS, TOEFL and Academic vocabulary.
To read the first article, please click on here.
Part of speech/ type of word: Abide is a verb.
Meaning: To respect or follow a certain rule or rules.
Preposition: It is usually followed by the preposition, ‘by’
Examples:
- “People who move to another country and live there should abide by the laws there.”
- “The success of this new policy depends on how many people abide by the new rules.”
- “Politicians must listen to the people and abide by their wishes.”
Now one of the purposes of these series of articles is for foreign students to read so many different examples of a word and how it is used that they just intrinsically develop a sense of what it means, how it used and the suitable contexts for its usage. So here are some more examples and orientated towards an IELTS, TOEFL or Academic context.
4. “The success of a system of rules depends on how many people abide by it.”
5. “They both agreed that regardless of the outcome they would abide by the judge’s decision.”
6. “Whatever policies the schools decides upon the parents and children should abide by them.”
7. “For an organisation to run effectively employees must be willing to abide by the decisions made by the senior management.”
8. “Whatever the public decides in a referendum the government should abide by that outcome.”
To learn a word and its definition is not enough. You need to learn the:
a: Pronunciation (not necessarily for writing but for speaking and listening)
b: Definition
c: Preposition that goes with it.
d: Whether we use infinitive e.g. ‘word + do do’ or ing, ‘word +…ing’. In the case ‘abide’ we use ‘by’ after the word itself.
e. The contexts it is used.
f. The collocations, which is of course related to point ‘e’ above.
Another meaning of ‘abide’ means to ‘tolerate, endure or accept certain things’.
Example:
“She simply could not abide such messiness!”
Meaning, she could not tolerate, endure, accept such messiness.
However for IELTS, this particular usage of the word is not that important to know, so it is more important to prioritize the first meaning mentioned above i.e. to respect, follow or comply with rules.
ABIDING.
‘Abiding’ is an adjective and it can mean something you remember for a long time.
Example: “My most abiding memory of school is our graduation party.”
This means what you remember the most or the memory that remains in your mind the longest is the graduation party.
Another example would be:
“His amazing speech left an abiding impact on us all.”
In the example above you could replace ‘abiding’ with a ‘long-lasting’.
In addition to ‘abiding’ itself, there is also ‘law-abiding’ which means to follow rules and be a citizen respectful of laws and authority.
Example: “”John is a polite and law-abiding citizen and member of the public.”
“This new law may be tough but it is only intended for criminals and law-abiding members of the public, have nothing to fear.”
If you have any questions, please fee free to ask in the comments section below!
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