Confusing word pairs can be the biggest banana skins in writing – keep your copy accurate by mastering 12 common culprits.
In my 20+ years of proofreading and copywriting, I’ve wrestled with the subjunctive mood, discovered the difference between mucus and mucous (explanation here if you must know), and checked the spellings of so many cast/crew names that IMDb must think I’m a robot. But I’ve also learnt that while these more complex details are grabbing our attention, it’s often the simpler details that prove the biggest trip hazards. The word pairs that look or sound alike but have different meanings/uses. The misplaced punctuation that leads the whole sentence astray. Or the double negative that says the exact opposite of what we intended.
Also, automated grammar/spelling checkers don’t always spot these simple errors. For example, a word might be spelled correctly, but it might be the wrong word in the context of that sentence.
That’s why, no matter how simple they may seem, it’s always a good idea to double check these basics in your copy – and never a good idea just to assume they’re right.
Commonly confusable
Some of the biggest banana skins in writing are the word pairs that look or sound very similar but have different meanings or uses. Depending on what you write about, there are many that may never bother you – such as mucus/mucous, tortuous/torturous or mantel/mantle – but others are so common in text that the wrong version can easily slip in unnoticed. Below are some of the commonly confused word pairs I always look out for in any text. You might think: ‘Duh, I would spot that a mile off.’ But it’s always worth double checking. Obviously, if you think: ‘I’m too busy, I need someone else to worry about that,’ you know where I am.
Affect and Effect
The simplest way to remember this is the RAVEN memory trick – Remember Affect is a Verb and Effect is a Noun. Most of the time anyway 😬. Affect as a verb means to influence or cause a change, and effect as a noun describes a result.
Examples:
She worried that the typo on the new sign would affect business. (verb – to influence)
She worried that the typo on the new sign would have a negative effect on business. (noun – a result)
As English loves a few curveballs, both words also have other less common uses. Affect can also be a verb meaning to assume or pretend (‘She affected an air of indifference.’), and it can be a noun relating to feeling or emotion (mainly used only in psychology). And effect can be a verb meaning to bring about or accomplish (‘to effect change’).
Bare and Bear
Bare and bear can both be verbs. Bare as a verb means to uncover or reveal, and bear as a verb means to support or hold up, to withstand or endure, to give birth to, etc. Bare as an adjective means naked, uncovered or simple. Bear as a noun refers to the big furry animal.
Examples:
The snowstorm didn’t stop the postman baring his legs in his shorts. (verb)
They couldn’t bear the idea of getting up early on a Sunday morning. (verb)
Now the kids were into Lego, walking around with bare feet was a risky business. (adjective)
Complement and Compliment
Complement, as a noun or verb, is about the addition of something that makes something else whole or complete or fills a need – think of the ‘e’ in complete and complement. Compliment, again as a noun or verb, refers to praise or the act of praising something or someone.
Examples:
Ketchup was the perfect complement to his chips.
Having received lots of compliments about his new jacket, he was annoyed when he got ketchup all over it.
Diffuse and Defuse
Diffuse means to disperse, spread or scatter widely or thinly. The original meaning of defuse was to remove the fuse from an explosive device, literally ‘de’ ‘fuse’, but it is now also used figuratively to refer to making a situation less dangerous or tense.
Discreet and Discrete
Discreet means to be cautious about something, to respect someone’s privacy or not share something of a sensitive nature. Discrete means unattached, separate or distinct.
Disinterested and Uninterested
If you have no stake in the outcome of something or are neutral or impartial about it, you are disinterested – you have no self-interest. But if you just don’t care about it, you are uninterested.
Lay and Lie
The verbs lay and lie cause a lot of confusion. Put simply, in the present tense, lay means to place something down flat and requires a direct object. Lie means to recline or be in a flat position on a surface and doesn’t require a direct object. And it also means an untruth. An easy way to remember is that the ‘a’ in lay sounds like the one in place – to place an object – and the ‘i’ in lie sounds like the one in recline. For any less straightforward requirements, you’ll need a longer explanation (and maybe a lie down).
Examples (verbs in the present tense):
I’ll lay the book here – it has a whole chapter about using lay and lie. (the object is the book)
I’ll read the book later. I need to lie down first. (no object)
Past and Passed
Past has a lot of uses – it can be a noun (at a time in the past), an adjective to describe a noun (in past times), a preposition in telling the time or referring to being or going beyond a space or position (half past two, the shop was past the library), or an adverb indicating passing by or beyond (walking past the shop). Passed can only be a form of the verb pass. This in itself has a lot of meanings (to move past, to let go, to reach the required standard, etc.), but put simply, if you need a verb you need passed, not past.
Practice and Practise
In US English, it’s always practice, whether it’s a noun or verb. But in British English, practice is the noun and practise is the verb. Think of advice (noun) and advise (verb) – the single letter difference is the same (for British English), but as they sound different, we rarely mix them up.
Examples:
As multiple car horns blared, it was obvious he needed more practice before his driving test. (noun)
He wanted to practise his driving again, but the instructor had stopped answering his calls. (verb – British English only)
Licence and License
A similar difference here (in British English) – licence is the noun and license is the verb. But in US English, license (with an ‘s’) is correct for both noun and verb.
Principal and Principle
Principal can be two things: a noun meaning a chief/head or something of first importance or an adjective meaning foremost or the first/highest in rank, importance, value, etc. Principle is always a noun and has a variety of meanings – key definitions are an accepted/professed rule of action/conduct or a fundamental truth/standard.
Examples:
Despite now being a teacher, she still dreaded going to the principal’s office. (noun – the head of the school)
His vegetarian meal lacked flavour, but the principal issue was that it had chicken in it. (adjective – the most important)
He couldn’t eat the chicken because it was against his principles. (noun – the person’s own rules of action/conduct)
Stationary and Stationery
The adjective stationary means being in a fixed position, not moving or not changing. The noun stationery refers to paper, envelopes, pencils, erasers, etc. You still remember those things, right?
This is just a small selection of words that are commonly confused or misspelt. Others include accept/except, bought/brought, brake/break, farther/further, here/hear, loose/lose, out/our, peace/piece, peak/peek, pedal/peddle, pore/poor/pour, quiet/quite, right/write, tail/tale, than/then, to/too/two, etc. With so many potential pitfalls, it’s always worth doing one read where you focus on spotting words that might have snuck into your text in the wrong form.
If you’d like more in-depth help, I highly recommend adding the Good Word Guide or Bill Bryson’s Troublesome Words to your reading list. Both are books I still regularly reach for. Or if you’d prefer to leave all this to someone else, contact me to find out how I can help.
