FREUDIAN SLIP. A term known technically in psychoanalysis as parapraxis, an unintentional mistake, usually in speech, that is held to reveal an unconscious (especially sexual) inclination or motivation: She What would you like: bread and butter or cake? He Bed and butter. In general use, the term often refers to any unintentional verbal slip. Compare SLIP OF THE TONGUE.

Freudian slip an unintentional error regarded as revealing subconscious feelings, named after the Austrian neurologist and psychotherapist Sigmund Freud (1856–1939). He was the first to emphasize the significance of unconscious processes in normal and neurotic behaviour, and was the founder of psychoanalysis as both a theory of personality and a therapeutic practice.

Freud·i·an slip • n. an unintentional error regarded as revealing subconscious feelings.