I was under the impression that 思った meant that, sometime in the past, you did
the instantaneous action of "think" and had a thought while 思っていた meant that
you kept a thought for a period of time. However, I did a search of "ずっと思った"
and found that there seemed to be an overlap with "ずっと思っていた" with sentences
such as "マンションに住んでよかったってずっと思った."
CC BY-SA 3.0
2015-02-19T04:21:01.327
22895
2015-02-20T01:53:47.937
7712
question
word-choice
Difference between 思った and 思っていた?
Your interpretation about 思った and 思っていた is CORRECT.

You usually don't say ずっと思った。, especially the use of ずっと is incorrect. The
only possible interpretation of

```

    マンションに住んでよかったってずっと思った
    
```

would be

```

    （何かをする度に）「マンションに住んでよかった」って 毎回 思った。
    
```

meaning "Every time I encountered a difference between life in マンション and life
in a 一戸建てor アパート, I felt that マンション was better."

ずっと is sometimes used for something that repeats, also for something
instantaneous but frequent.

similar to 頻繁に, 常に, 毎回。

Also, unlike 思った, using 思っていた near a clear context of time without information
on how you think now usually means you dont think so anymore, you changed your
mind. Especially when you're talking about a point of view. In such situation,
if you still think the same way, you should say it explicitly.

```

    学生時代は朝ご飯を食べないほうが良いと思っていたから朝は食べていなかった。今はお昼が遅いから朝食べている。
    
```
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2015-02-20T00:31:56.910
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2015-02-20T01:53:47.937
2015-02-20T01:53:47.937
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answer