rejection

American  

[ri-jek-shuhn] / rɪˈdʒɛk ʃən /

noun

• rejections
  plural

1. the act or process of rejecting.

   Synonyms:

   elimination, dismissal, refusal

2. the state of being rejected.

   Synonyms:

   elimination, dismissal, refusal

3. something that is rejected.

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rejection Cultural  

1. A process in which the immune system of a body attacks an organ or tissue, either its own or tissue transplanted into it from another organism. (See xenotransplantation.)

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Discover More

Rejection is the most serious problem faced in surgery involving organ transplants. Drugs are used to suppress the immune system after organ transplant in order to prevent the rejection of and eventual death of the transplanted tissue.

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• nonrejection
  noun
• prerejection
  noun

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• rejections
  plural

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Etymology

Origin of rejection

First recorded in 1545–55; from Latin rējectiōn-, stem of rējectiō “a throwing back”; equivalent to reject + -ion

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Explanation

The noun rejection can refer to the actual act of rejecting something or to the feeling one has after being rejected. In other words, you might have feelings of rejection after experiencing the rejection of others. The Latin noun rēicere, which means "to throw back," is the ancestor of the word rejection. Nobody likes to feel the rejection of being excluded. The word rejection became popular in psychology in 1931, when parental rejection was seen as a motivation of bad behavior in children. The word found a medical meaning by 1943, as the body's refusal to accept a transplant.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

rejection rejections

I suspect the rate of unfounded rejection as well as the rate of founded rejection of parents varies dramatically by location and socioeconomic class.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 14, 2026

Mixed-genet pairings resulted in the corals deploying stinging cells, a hostile response that can be likened to organ rejection in humans.

From Barron's ● Oct. 14, 2026

Conditional approval is better than a rejection, but the message from the state and the county is fairly consistent: Making the necessary cuts will be hard and detrimental; not making them would be disastrous.

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 6, 2026

Its most recent survey suggested that, on the eve of the election, both candidates had the same rejection rate with voters: 45%.

From BBC ● Oct. 5, 2026

Emma could not have desired a more spirited rejection of Mr. Martin’s prose.

From "Emma" by Jane Austen

He took these rejections hard at the time.

From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 25, 2026

After 23 years of struggle and 60 rejections, I’d sold a hardcover memoir to Random House that led to a series of books.

From Salon ● Aug. 24, 2026

Replimune and other industry officials said the FDA, in its rejections, had reversed positions it had established in earlier meetings with the company.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 6, 2026

Despite rejections from Uefa and Concacaf, Fifa initially vowed to continue with its proposals on Friday, saying "nobody is selling football".

From BBC ● Aug. 1, 2026

Mom once told me that Dad’s father interpreted all of Dad’s big goals as rejections of the family he came from.

From "Keeping Pace" by Laurie Morrison

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Related Words

• elimination
• exclusion
• repudiation
• veto

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