Circumlocution

Definition

The use of an unnecessarily large number of words to express an idea. Evasion in speech. Circumlocutions are often used by persons with aphasia when having difficulty recalling or retrieving a word. In place of the target word, a description of the word is used. Circumlocutions, or “substitutions of object description (e.g., snow/soft, white/cold) and instrumental function (e.g., watch/knowing the hour) can be observed in aphasic output” (Benson & Ardila, 1996; p. 53). They occur frequently with a posterior (sensory) aphasia.

Circumlocutions can represent a positive symptom of anomia in which, upon failure to retrieve a word, the subject talks around the word by defining it, describing a referent, or even making sound effects. Pointing to his wrist, a patient might say, “I wear it right here, and I tell time with it; mine goes tick, tick.” The use of circumlocutions “is indicative of intact semantic activation and a general capacity to retrieve lexical forms” (Davis, p. 109)....