flight of ideas

American  

noun

Psychiatry.

1. a rapid flow of thought, manifested by accelerated speech with abrupt changes from topic to topic: a symptom of some mental illnesses, especially manic disorder.

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Example Sentences

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flight of ideas

In the so-called "flight of ideas" words succeed each other with incredible rapidity, without goal idea, but each word suggesting the next by sound or other association, thus: "Are you blue?"

From Why Worry? by George Lincoln Walton

The report from there stated that she was for ten days "elated, excited, talkative, with flight of ideas."

From Benign Stupors A Study of a New Manic-Depressive Reaction Type by John T. (John Thompson) MacCurdy

In the first part of this period after her return, she was somewhat elated and overtalkative, though she did not present a flight of ideas, and was well behaved.

From Benign Stupors A Study of a New Manic-Depressive Reaction Type by John T. (John Thompson) MacCurdy

By means of distinctions we ought to struggle against this flowing away and flight of ideas.

From The Mind and the Brain Being the Authorised Translation of L'Âme et le Corps by Alfred Binet

By a natural flight of ideas, the loathing of the city turned to loathing of himself—to an unsatiable desire for self-forgetfulness, for self-effacement.

From Max by Katherine Cecil Thurston