underpinnings

British

/ ˈʌndəˌpɪnɪŋz /

plural noun

any supporting structure or system

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

She examines the genetic underpinnings of human behaviors, aging, and athletic pursuits.

From The Wall Street Journal • Feb. 3, 2026

Indeed, Joel Mokyr, Philippe Aghion, and Peter Howitt won this year’s Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences for establishing the theoretical underpinnings of this dynamic.

From Barron's • Dec. 1, 2025

But it only ever feels like homage, not anything organic — Stuckmann doesn’t have his mentor’s storytelling smarts, nor his flair for the underpinnings of normality that ground horror.

From Los Angeles Times • Oct. 23, 2025

Brent Ellis, principal analyst at market researcher Forrester, said the outage exposed what he called the "nested dependency" between popular digital platforms and the array of services providing the web's technical underpinnings.

From BBC • Oct. 21, 2025

I was attracted to the scientific underpinnings of dialectical materialism, for I am always inclined to trust what I can verify.

From "Long Walk to Freedom" by Nelson Mandela

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023