Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun A spontaneous, logically unconstrained and undirected association of ideas, emotions, and feelings.
- noun A psychoanalytic technique in which a patient's articulation of free associations is encouraged in order to reveal unconscious thoughts and emotions, such as traumatic experiences that have been repressed.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun (psychoanalysis) The act or process of free-associating. It is a technique used in psychoanalysis and is supposed to allow the analyst access to the unconscious thoughts of the analysand. See
free-associate .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun a thought process in which ideas (words or images) suggest other ideas in a sequence
Etymologies
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Examples
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Progressives don't shoot people in churches, drag them behind trucks or generally try to suppress their fundamental human rights like free association. says ...
Hollywood Elsewhere 2010
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