Eggcorn Forum

The phrase “wishful thinking” shows up in written English in the 1930s. It is probably one of the stable of phrases introduced or resemanticized by the new field of psychoanalysis. Someone who engages in wishful thinking allows a belief about upcoming events to be shaped by what the person hopes will happen rather than by what a common-sense analysis suggests will be the outcome.

“Wistful,” which at one point referred to a state of careful attention, is now used in English to describe a certain kind of feeling, a certain set of the eyes. A “wistful look” indicates an eager-but-at-times-melancholy countenance.

The formation and evolution of “wistful” may have been influenced by the word “wishful.” The two words have enough independence in modern English, however, to make their confusion a certifiable error. Saying that your partner gives you a “wistful, wishful look” is not a redundant phrase.

“Wistful thinking” is a common expression, with over 20K hits on Google, many of them non-duplicates. Some of the web pages use “wistful thinking” correctly, of course, referring to an eager, yet sad, state of mind, but the vast majority of these hits seem to be substitutes for “wishful thinking.” When “wistful” lends some its semantics to the understanding of the phrase, it is an eggcorn.

Examples:

Blog comment: “Typical student. I know it’s really just plain wistful thinking.”

Blog entry: “Neither the Chinese or We Americans will be saved by wistful thinking, and structural changes are necessary in both Economies; ”

Comment on a blog: “because everything that occurred after the Hail Mary pass worked was just wistful thinking,