0 the fact that you like something or someone more than another thing or person: --
He studied chemistry in preference to physics at university.
Special preferences were offered initially to encourage investment.
We give preference to those who have worked with us for a long time.
It would be wrong to discriminate against a candidate because of their sexual preference (= the sex of the people they are sexually attracted to).
Choosing furniture is largely a matter of personal preference.
Her preference is for comfortable rather than stylish clothes.
1 A preference is also an advantage given to someone: --
[ U ] The city gives preference to job applicants who live there.
2 the fact of liking or wanting one thing more than another: --
3 an advantage or better treatment that is given to a person or a group of people: --
4 used to describe a company's shares that have the right to fixed dividends (= payments from profits) before the dividends on its ordinary shares are calculated and paid in a particular period, or in periods when dividends on these shares are not paid at all: --
The right panel shows the structural relation between resistance to change and preference.
The salience of family relationships is supported by findings from studies that address patient experiences, preferences, and needs.
The party preference equation represents the selection process that determined which respondents were asked the strategic party switching question.
Of course adaptation to consumers' preferences took on a specific form.
In primary schools, the class teacher teaches all the subjects in the curriculum to the class, regardless of his preferences, flair and interests.
Depending on the market context, preference, type of technical change, and the nature of the crop, the net effect could go in any direction.
Residents who had been involved in preference relocations stressed the importance of having choices for their initial and subsequent moves into, within and between care-homes.
Citizens have single-peaked preferences over policy outcomes, represented by a concave utility function that attains a maximum at the citizen's ideal point xi.
