CONFABULATION

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does confabulation mean? 

• CONFABULATION (noun)
  The noun CONFABULATION has 2 senses:

1. an informal conversation

2. (psychiatry) a plausible but imagined memory that fills in gaps in what is remembered

  Familiarity information: CONFABULATION used as a noun is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• CONFABULATION (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

An informal conversation

Classified under:

Nouns denoting communicative processes and contents

Synonyms:

chat; confab; confabulation; schmoose; schmooze

Hypernyms ("confabulation" is a kind of...):

conversation (the use of speech for informal exchange of views or ideas or information etc.)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "confabulation"):

causerie; chin-wag; chin-wagging; chin wag; chin wagging; chit-chat; chit chat; chitchat; gab; gabfest; gossip; small talk; tittle-tattle (light informal conversation for social occasions)

Derivation:

confabulate (have a conference in order to talk something over)

confabulate (talk socially without exchanging too much information)

Sense 2

Meaning:

(psychiatry) a plausible but imagined memory that fills in gaps in what is remembered

Classified under:

Nouns denoting cognitive processes and contents

Hypernyms ("confabulation" is a kind of...):

memory (something that is remembered)

Domain category:

psychiatry; psychological medicine; psychopathology (the branch of medicine dealing with the diagnosis and treatment of mental disorders)

Derivation:

confabulate (unconsciously replace fact with fantasy in one's memory)

 Context examples 

Signs and symptoms include anterograde and retrograde amnesia, confabulation, apathy, ataxia, and coma.

(Korsakoff Syndrome, NCI Thesaurus)

To much confabulation succeeded a sound of scrubbing and setting to rights; and when I passed the room, in going downstairs to dinner, I saw through the open door that all was again restored to complete order; only the bed was stripped of its hangings.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)