【Abstracted】 , 【preoccupied】 , 【absent】 , 【absentminded】 and 【distraught】 all are comparable when they mean inattentive to what presently claims or demands consideration.

【Abstracted】 implies absorption of the mind in something other than one’s surroundings, and often suggests reflection on weighty matters.

• Then he sat and thought . . . in the concentrated, 【abstracted】 way he has . . . almost forgetting my presence.
  —Rose Macaulay

【Preoccupied】 implies unreadiness for any new demands on one’s attention because one is already busy with other thoughts or occupations.

• Edna was so 【preoccupied】 with misgivings as to whether he wanted to marry her that she had never faced squarely the more important problem of whether she wanted to marry him.
  — Barnes

【Absent】 stresses inability to fix the mind on present concerns; it often connotes mental wandering rather than concentration on other things.

• Sir Joshua . . . was quite 【absent】 all the day, not knowing a word that was said to him.
  —Burney

【Absentminded】 implies that the mind is fixed elsewhere; it suggests abstractedness or preoccupation more than absentness.

• She would make some 【absentminded】 , irrelevant remark, as if she had not heard him.
  —Rôlvaag

It often implies a mental habit rather than a present mood.

• 【absentminded】 professor

【Distraught】 suggests inability to concentrate and also implies an agitated state of mind caused by worry or perplexity.

• Oh, if I wake, shall I not be 【distraught】 , environed with all these hideous fears?
  —Shak.
• 【distraught】 with grief for the dead queen
  —Millay