This means that the binary relation s i s k ("the gloss of synset s i contains a term belonging to synset s k "), which induces a directed graph on the set of WordNet synsets, may be thought of as a channel through which positivity and negativity flow, from the definiendum (the synset s i being defined) to the definiens (a synset s k that contributes to the definition of s i by virtue of its member terms occurring in the gloss of s i ).
if a synset s i is known to be positive (negative), this can be viewed as an indication that the synsets s k to which the terms occurring in the gloss of s i belong, are themselves positive (negative).