Word.ws English Dictionary

afference

/ˈæfəɹəns/

afference noun: the brain’s reception of signals from the body.

Noun

afference (countable and uncountable, plural afferences)

  1. The brain’s reception of signals from the body.
    • Christina had lost this normal inflow, this afference, had lost her normal proprioceptive vocal tone and posture, and therefore had to use her ears, auditory feedback, instead.1984, Oliver Sacks, “The Disembodied Lady”, chapter 3 in The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat (Reset 2007), page 53

Forms of afference

pluralafferences

Origin of afference

Adjective form of afferent, from French afférent (“which brings inward”), from Latin afferent-, from afferēns, present participle of afferre (“bring to”), from af- (variant of ad-) + ferre (“bear”). Doublet of afferentia.

Words formed from afference

Questions about afference

What does afference mean?
Afference means the brain’s reception of signals from the body.
What part of speech is afference?
Afference is a noun.
How do you pronounce afference?
Afference is pronounced /ˈæfəɹəns/.
What is the plural of afference?
The plural of afference is afferences.

Words near afference in the dictionary

  1. Affeldt
  2. Affeldts
  3. affenpinscher
  4. Affenpinschers
  5. Affenspalte
  6. afference
  7. afferences
  8. afferent
  9. afferent loop syndrome
  10. afferentation
  11. afferentations

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: afference (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “afference.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/afference. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.