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Preference vs Sympathy - What's the difference?

preference | sympathy | Related terms |

Preference is a related term of sympathy.


As nouns the difference between preference and sympathy

is that preference is preference while sympathy is a feeling of pity or sorrow for the suffering or distress of another; compassion.

preference

English

(wikipedia preference)

Alternative forms

* (archaic)

Noun

(Preferans) (en noun)
  • The selection of one thing or person over others.
  • The option to so select, and the one selected.
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-14, author=(Jonathan Freedland)
    • , volume=189, issue=1, page=18, magazine=(The Guardian Weekly) , title= Obama's once hip brand is now tainted , passage=Where we once sent love letters in a sealed envelope, or stuck photographs of our children in a family album, now such private material is despatched to servers and clouds operated by people we don't know and will never meet. Perhaps we assume that our name, address and search preferences will be viewed by some unseen pair of corporate eyes, probably not human, and don't mind that much.}}
  • The state of being preferred over others.
  • A strong liking or personal valuation.
  • A preferential bias; partiality; discrimination.
  • Preferans, a card game, principally played in Eastern Europe.

    • Verb

    (preferenc)
  • (US) To give preferential treatment to; to give a preference to.

    • See also

    * preferences ----

    sympathy

    English

    (wikipedia sympathy)

    Noun

    (sympathies)
  • A feeling of pity or sorrow for the suffering or distress of another; compassion.
  • The ability to share the feelings of another.
  • A mutual relationship between people or things such that they are correspondingly affected by any condition.
  • * 1997 , Chris Horrocks, Introducing Foucault'', page 67, ''The Renaissance Episteme (Totem Books, Icon Books; ISBN 1840460865)
    • 'Sympathy' likened anything to anything else in universal attraction, e.g. the fate of men to the course of the planets.
  • Tendency towards or approval of the aims of a movement.

    • Usage notes

    * Used similarly to empathy, interchangeably in looser usage. In stricter usage, (term) is stronger and more intimate, while sympathy is weaker and more distant; see .

    Antonyms

    * contempt (context-dependent)

    Derived terms

    * (l) * (l) * (l), (l)