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Incentive vs Foment - What's the difference?

incentive | foment |

As verbs the difference between incentive and foment

is that incentive is while foment is to incite or cause troublesome acts; to encourage; to instigate.

incentive

Noun

(en noun)
  • Something that motivates, rouses, or encourages.
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-07, author=David Simpson
  • , volume=188, issue=26, page=36, magazine=(The Guardian Weekly) , title= Fantasy of navigation , passage=It is tempting to speculate about the incentives or compulsions that might explain why anyone would take to the skies in [the] basket [of a balloon]: perhaps out of a desire to escape the gravity of this world or to get a preview of the next; […].}}
  • A bonus or reward, often monetary, to work harder.
  • Antonyms

    * disincentive

    Derived terms

    * incentivise/incentivize, tax incentive

    Adjective

    (en adjective)
  • Inciting; encouraging or moving; rousing to action; stimulating.
  • * Dr. H. More
  • Competency is the most incentive to industry.
  • Serving to kindle or set on fire.
  • * Milton
  • Part incentive reed / Provide, pernicious with one touch of fire.

    foment

    English

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To incite or cause troublesome acts; to encourage; to instigate.
  • He was arrested for fomenting a riot; after all, it's bad enough being in a riot but starting one is much worse.
  • (medicine) To apply a poultice to; to bathe with a cloth or sponge.
  • * 1904, Arthur Conan Doyle, The Adventure of the Abbey Grange , Norton (2005), page 1178,
  • The maid had entered with us, and began once more to foment the bruise upon her mistress's brow.

    Derived terms

    * fomentation