Verb
stand in for (third-person singular simple present stands in for, present participle standing in for, simple past and past participle stood in for)
(idiomatic, transitive) To replace; to act as a double or substitute for.
I asked my colleague to stand in for me so I could take the day off.
We sometimes need to create unreal monsters and bogies to stand in for all the things we fear in our real lives. Stephen King
I have found that-- just as in real life--imagination sometimes has to stand in for experience. Steve Martin
To understand the world at all, sometimes you could only focus on a tiny bit of it, look very hard at what was close to hand and make it stand in for the whole. Donna Tartt
I was trying to write an autobiography using prints and patterns that reference emotional, psychological, and personal development in my work, as a person growing up, figuring out who I was. I used fabrics to stand in for occurrences. Jim Hodges
When I started working with mirrors, it seemed to be the perfect material to stand in for that waiting. Jim Hodges
But one can also stand in for bigger sub parts of a noun phrase. Source: Internet