anal retentive
5
9.6
- adjective
- /ˈeɪnəl rɪˈtɛntɪv/
- Specialized
:
anal retentivo
- Her anal retentive tendencies make it difficult for her to relax even on vacation.
- the most anal retentive
- anal retentive type
- anal retentive person
Examples
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He is so anal retentive that he organizes his books by color and size.
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This is a man who is truly anal retentive.
Blog text (32) -
We are anal-retentive about the details.
Blog text (28) -
I'm what your average psychiatrist would call "anal-retentive."
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I doubt whether you could remain anal retentive for very long.
Fiction book (1990) -
"Oh, please!" Alan had to be the most anal-retentive person Lizzie knew.
Fiction book (2002) -
I can come across as anal-retentive, even severely Monk-ish.
Blog text (8) -
Let it never be said that your anal retentive attention to detail never yielded positive results.
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There's a guy here-- fortyish, anal retentive type, right?
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Some act like it's a flaw, like I'm anal retentive or obsessive-compulsive.
Blog text (14)
Antonyms
How Orderly
Surface Forms
Morphology
Retentive clearly signals ‘holding on’ and the compound historically comes from the psychoanalytic ‘anal’ stage, so there is a semantic link to excessive control/orderliness. However, a B1 learner who only knows ‘anal’ as a bodily term and ‘retentive’ as ‘able to retain’ will not reliably infer the personality sense (perfectionism/obsessiveness) without cultural or psychoanalytic background, so the relation is only partially transparent.
Etymology
Anal retentive comes from an old psychology idea about 'toilet training'. In the story, anal points to the body area used in 'toilet training' and retentive means 'holding on'. So someone called anal retentive is seen as very strict about order and small details, which is why the phrase means 'very tidy' or 'perfectionist' today.