confabulation
/kənˌfæbjʊˈleɪʃən/
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: 1.75 in modern English
20
Scrabble Score
13
Letters
5
Syllables
10
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
A fabricated memory believed to be true, especially in someone with dementia or with encephalopathy from advanced alcoholism.
Countable; Uncountable
Example Sentences
- "[…] Mrs Grantly was preparing herself for a grand attack which she was to make on her father, as agreed upon between herself and her husband during their curtain confabulation of that morning."
- "The schoolroom piano broke into all gruesome fancies; and when that failed there were confabulations in corners, with a sequel of one of them going out in the highest spirits in order to “come in” as something new."
- "The vision had roused a host of other associations, and he sat looking with new eyes at the library which, for over thirty years, had been the scene of his solitary musings and of all the family confabulations."
- "For Örulv and Hydén, confabulation is ‘world-making’ (669). What the person with AD chooses to enunciate, ‘may capture something important in the way the person makes sense of his or her life and also make meaning-based connections’ (Hydén and Örulv 2009: 206)."
- "Segal said another characteristic of Trump’s questionable mental acuity is confabulation. “It’s where he takes an idea or something that’s happened and he adds to it things that have not happened.”"
Etymology
From Middle English confabulacion (“conversation”), from Latin confābulātiōnem, from cōnfābulārī + -tiōnem.
Origin
Word Breakdown
- Root: *bʰeh₂-, confabulacion, confābulātiōnem
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /kənˌfæbjʊˈleɪʃən/
- British English: /kənˌfæbjʊˈleɪʃən/