preoccupy
verb (used with object)
to absorb or engross to the exclusion of other things.
have preoccupied
-
present perfectof preoccupy.present perfect
Used to describe actions that started in the past and continue into or have direct relevance to the present.
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
A “salon” of multiple smaller works introduced each section, enlarging on Mr. Whitney’s shift from gatherings of blunt, sometimes layered, rounded forms to the abutments of rectangles that have preoccupied him since the 1990s.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 25, 2025
The questions of what subjective experience is, who has it and how it relates to the physical world around us have preoccupied philosophers for most of recorded history.
From Scientific American ● Sep. 8, 2023
In his long life there is much to gossip about, and the biography avoids most of the sordid details that might have preoccupied a less serious biographer.
From Washington Post ● Apr. 11, 2023
Another task for Musk: delivering on his promise to clean up the fake profiles, or “spam bots” that have preoccupied him and bedeviled Twitter since long before he expressed interest in acquiring it.
From Seattle Times ● Oct. 28, 2022
The question of promoting agriculture seems to have preoccupied the minds of the readers at that time.
From The History of Cuba, vol. 2 by Willis Fletcher Johnson
