When we talk about the meaning of a word, we can talk about its two aspects: denotation and connotation. Denotative meaning is the literal, basic meaning of the word. You will always encounter it in dictionaries when looking for what the word means. Though, there is another kind of meaning, the one we refer to as the connotative meaning.It includes emotions and associations connected to a certain word and is usually not a part of dictionary definitions.
Connotation can be positive, neutral, and negative. <em>Economical</em> and <em>stingy </em>have similar meanings: <em>careful not to waste money or resources</em>. The difference in connotation is present, as being economical is a positive trait, while stinginess is not, as a stingy person usually isn't simply careful about not unnecessarily spending but is very ungenerous and mean as well.
