clang association
noun
\ ˈklaŋ-
\
\
Medical Definition of clang association
: association of words based on their similar sound rather than meaning
Note: Clang association occurs in schizophrenia and in the manic phase of bipolar disorder.
Clang associations involve a persistent focus on the sound rather than on the meaning of verbal productions. Clang associations sometimes occur to a subject's own comments when the sound of some word he has used becomes fixed in his associations.— Irving B. Weiner, Psychodiagnosis in Schizophrenia, 1966