Definitions for: Compensation


[n] the act of compensating for service or loss or injury
[n] something (such as money) given or received as payment or reparation (as for a service or loss or injury)
[n] (psychiatry) a defense mechanism that conceals your undesirable shortcomings by exaggerating desirable behaviors



Webster (1913) Definition: Com`pen*sa"tion, n. [L. compensatio a weighing, a
balancing of accounts.]
1. The act or principle of compensating. --Emerson.

2. That which constitutes, or is regarded as, an equivalent;
that which makes good the lack or variation of something
else; that which compensates for loss or privation;
amends; remuneration; recompense.

The parliament which dissolved the monastic
foundations . . . vouchsafed not a word toward
securing the slightest compensation to the
dispossessed owners. --Hallam.

No pecuniary compensation can possibly reward them.
--Burke.

3. (Law)
(a) The extinction of debts of which two persons are
reciprocally debtors by the credits of which they are
reciprocally creditors; the payment of a debt by a
credit of equal amount; a set-off. --Bouvier.
--Wharton.
(b) A recompense or reward for some loss or service.
(c) An equivalent stipulated for in contracts for the sale
of real estate, in which it is customary to provide
that errors in description, etc., shall not avoid, but
shall be the subject of compensation.

Compensation balance, or Compensated balance, a kind of
balance wheel for a timepiece. The rim is usually made of
two different metals having different expansibility under
changes of temperature, so arranged as to counteract each
other and preserve uniformity of movement.

Compensation pendulum. See Pendulum.

Syn: Recompense; reward; indemnification; consideration;
requital; satisfaction; set-off.

Synonyms: recompense

See Also: amends, blood money, correction, counterbalance, damages, defence, defence mechanism, defence reaction, defense, defense mechanism, defense reaction, emolument, indemnification, indemnification, indemnity, offset, overcompensation, overcompensation, recompense, rectification, redress, reimbursement, reparation, restitution, workmen's compensation

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