perseveration

1. (psychology) An uncontrollable repetition of a particular response, such as a word, phrase, or gesture, despite the absence or cessation of a stimulus, usually caused by a brain injury or other organic disorder.countableuncountable

2. (psychology) The tendency to continue or repeat an act or activity after the cessation of the original stimulus.countableuncountable

3. (derogatory) An argument by repetition; a mantra.Examples: "Being subjected to this mantra once more re-evokes the perseveration we routinely suffer in the moral ambiguity characterising our supposedly post-politics milieu."; "Perseveration with demonstrably false arguments. This is illustrated for creationism by the ability to construct an Index to Creationist Claims which describes the plethora of such false arguments, rebutted over and over in the scientific literature but persisted in by creationists."countablederogatoryuncountable