Word that means your choice

На основании Вашего запроса эти примеры могут содержать грубую лексику.

На основании Вашего запроса эти примеры могут содержать разговорную лексику.

выбор слов

выбора слов

выборе слов

подбор слов

выбора слова

выборе слова

выбором слов

выбору слов

слова избранность

Tone is just as important as word choice.

Тон голоса так же важен, как и выбор слов.

Your word choice might not seem important, but it can actually help you sound more intelligence.

Ваш выбор слов может показаться не важным, но она может реально помочь вам звук больше интеллекта.

It’s an interesting word choice, since you already did.

Интересный выбор слова, так как ты уже настроила.

The right word choice can help change their perspective for better or for worse.

Правильный выбор слова может помочь изменить перспективу человека в лучшую или худшую сторону.

If you only make an occasional pronunciation mistake while having perfect grammar and word choice, you’ll be okay.

Если Вы делаете случайную ошибку произношения, имея идеальную грамматику и словарный запас, все в порядке.

However, word choice, style, syntax and narrative focus all indicate Faulkner as almost certainly being the author of this work.

Тем не менее, словарный запас, стиль, синтаксис и манера изложения указывают, что автором этого произведения почти наверняка является Фолкнер.

Additionally, poor word choice can lead to confusing sentences, decreasing the quality of your communication with site visitors.

Кроме того, неправильный выбор слов может привести к путанице в предложениях, что приведет к снижению качества общения с посетителями сайта.

Often, it’s just a case of word choice and simple formatting.

Часто это просто выбор слов и простое форматирование.

Even my word choice is different.

Because the word choice has no meaning.

Careful word choice is important in this field, as is an attention to detail.

Тщательный выбор слова имеет важное значение в этой области, как и внимание к деталям.

The tone and word choice throughout the copy should speak the brand’s language.

Тон и выбор слова в тексте должны соответствовать языку бренда.

You now have the opportunity to refine your word choice.

К счастью, у вас еще есть шанс пересмотреть свой выбор слов.

This is the same as a piece of literature or rhetoric delivering its information through word choice, layout, and structure.

Это то же самое, как часть литературы или Риторика доставки информации через выбор слов, макет и структуру.

Of course, my English teacher always taught me that word choice is key.

Конечно, мой преподаватель английского всегда учил меня, что выбор слов является ключевым.

The researchers measured parents’ vocal responses, word and sentence length, and word choice when they responded to their infants’ vocalizations.

Исследователи измерили голосовые ответы родителей, длину слова и предложения и выбор слова, когда они отвечали на слова и вопросы своих детей.

Compelling headlines often zero in on a common pain point that the product or service solves and include careful word choice that reflects the voice of the brand.

Убедительные заголовки часто указывают на общую болевую точку, которую решает продукт или услуга, и включают тщательный выбор слов, который отражает голос бренда.

Refine your spelling, grammar, and word choice to enhance your content

Улучшайте свое правописание, грамматику и выбор слов, чтобы улучшить содержание

Find out the choices that appeal most to your target audience, whether it’s with colors, fonts, offers, or word choice.

Узнайте, какие варианты больше всего подходят для вашей целевой аудитории, будь то цвета, шрифты, предложения или выбор слов.

Open word choice: Ask users to list 3 to 5 words that describe the design

Открытый выбор слов: попросите пользователей привести от З до 5 слов, описывающих конкретный дизайн

Ничего не найдено для этого значения.

Результатов: 137. Точных совпадений: 137. Затраченное время: 126 мс

Documents

Корпоративные решения

Спряжение

Синонимы

Корректор

Справка и о нас

Индекс слова: 1-300, 301-600, 601-900

Индекс выражения: 1-400, 401-800, 801-1200

Индекс фразы: 1-400, 401-800, 801-1200

1) You come to a fork in the road.

You need to make a choice between going left or right. You face a decision between the left path and the right path. You have the option to advance in either direction.

2) You go right.

Right was your choice. Right was your decision. Right was the option you selected.

In the case of 2), each of the three words is used to denote an alternative. Right is a choice, a decision, an option, or an alternative. In the case of 1), each word is used to denote a set of competing alternatives. «Left or right?» is a choice to be made, a decision to be faced, an option of which way to go, or a set of competing alternatives.

All three of these words seem to be ambiguous between 1) and 2) (and of course, there’s nothing special about the fork in the road example; this is a general problem that can make it difficult to use these words effectively in some contexts). What I would like to ask for are two separate lists of a few words that are uniquely appropriate for 1), and a few other words that are uniquely appropriate for 2). Thus far it seems alternative and selection might work uniquely for 2), but I’ve come up with nothing at all uniquely applicable to 1).

All strong writers have something in common: they understand the value of word choice in writing. Strong word choice uses vocabulary and language to maximum effect, creating clear moods and images and making your stories and poems more powerful and vivid.

The meaning of “word choice” may seem self-explanatory, but to truly transform your style and writing, we need to dissect the elements of choosing the right word. This article will explore what word choice is, and offer some examples of effective word choice, before giving you 5 word choice exercises to try for yourself.

Word Choice Definition: The Four Elements of Word Choice

The definition of word choice extends far beyond the simplicity of “choosing the right words.” Choosing the right word takes into consideration many different factors, and finding the word that packs the most punch requires both a great vocabulary and a great understanding of the nuances in English.

Choosing the right word involves the following four considerations, with word choice examples.

1. Meaning

Words can be chosen for one of two meanings: the denotative meaning or the connotative meaning. Denotation refers to the word’s basic, literal dictionary definition and usage. By contrast, connotation refers to how the word is being used in its given context: which of that word’s many uses, associations, and connections are being employed.

A word’s denotative meaning is its literal dictionary definition, while its connotative meaning is the web of uses and associations it carries in context.

We play with denotations and connotations all the time in colloquial English. As a simple example, when someone says “greaaaaaat” sarcastically, we know that what they’re referring to isn’t “great” at all. In context, the word “great” connotes its opposite: something so bad that calling it “great” is intentionally ridiculous. When we use words connotatively, we’re letting context drive the meaning of the sentence.

The rich web of connotations in language are crucial to all writing, and perhaps especially so to poetry, as in the following lines from Derek Walcott’s Nobel-prize-winning epic poem Omeros:

In hill-towns, from San Fernando to Mayagüez,
the same sunrise stirred the feathered lances of cane
down the archipelago’s highways. The first breeze

rattled the spears and their noise was like distant rain
marching down from the hills, like a shell at your ears.

Sugar cane isn’t, literally, made of “feathered lances,” which would literally denote “long metal spears adorned with bird feathers”; but feathered connotes “branching out,” the way sugar cane does, and lances connotes something tall, straight, and pointy, as sugar cane is. Together, those two words create a powerfully true visual image of sugar cane—in addition to establishing the martial language (“spears,” “marching”) used elsewhere in the passage.

Whether in poetry or prose, strong word choice can unlock images, emotions, and more in the reader, and the associations and connotations that words bring with them play a crucial role in this.

2. Specificity

Use words that are both correct in meaning and specific in description.

In the sprawling English language, one word can have dozens of synonyms. That’s why it’s important to use words that are both correct in meaning and specific in description. Words like “good,” “average,” and “awful” are far less descriptive and specific than words like “liberating” (not just good but good and freeing), “C student” (not just average but academically average), and “despicable” (not just awful but morally awful). These latter words pack more meaning than their blander counterparts.

Since more precise words give the reader added context, specificity also opens the door for more poetic opportunities. Take the short poem “[You Fit Into Me]” by Margaret Atwood.

You fit into me
like a hook into an eye

A fish hook

An open eye

The first stanza feels almost romantic until we read the second stanza. By clarifying her language, Atwood creates a simple yet highly emotive duality.

This is also why writers like Stephen King advocate against the use of adverbs (adjectives that modify verbs or other adjectives, like “very”). If your language is precise, you don’t need adverbs to modify the verbs or adjectives, as those words are already doing enough work. Consider the following comparison:

Weak description with adverbs: He cooks quite badly; the food is almost always extremely overdone.

Strong description, no adverbs: He incinerates food.

Of course, non-specific words are sometimes the best word, too! These words are often colloquially used, so they’re great for writing description, writing through a first-person narrative, or for transitional passages of prose.

3. Audience

Good word choice takes the reader into consideration. You probably wouldn’t use words like “lugubrious” or “luculent” in a young adult novel, nor would you use words like “silly” or “wonky” in a legal document.

This is another way of saying that word choice conveys not only direct meaning, but also a web of associations and feelings that contribute to building the reader’s world. What world does the word “wonky” help build for your reader, and what world does the word “seditious” help build? Depending on the overall environment you’re working to create for the reader, either word could be perfect—or way out of place.

4. Style

Consider your word choice to be the fingerprint of your writing.

Consider your word choice to be the fingerprint of your writing. Every writer uses words differently, and as those words come to form poems, stories, and books, your unique grasp on the English language will be recognizable by all your readers.

Style isn’t something you can point to, but rather a way of describing how a writer writes. Ernest Hemingway, for example, is known for his terse, no-nonsense, to-the-point styles of description. Virginia Woolf, by contrast, is known for writing that’s poetic, intense, and melodramatic, and James Joyce for his lofty, superfluous writing style.

Here’s a paragraph from Joyce:

Had Pyrrhus not fallen by a beldam’s hand in Argos or Julius Caesar not been knifed to death. They are not to be thought away. Time has branded them and fettered they are lodged in the room of the infinite possibilities they have ousted.

And here’s one from Hemingway:

Bill had gone into the bar. He was standing talking with Brett, who was sitting on a high stool, her legs crossed. She had no stockings on.

Style is best observed and developed through a portfolio of writing. As you write more and form an identity as a writer, the bits of style in your writing will form constellations.

Word Choice in Writing: The Importance of Verbs

Before we offer some word choice exercises to expand your writing horizons, we first want to mention the importance of verbs. Verbs, as you may recall, are the “action” of the sentence—they describe what the subject of the sentence actually does. Unless you are intentionally breaking grammar rules, all sentences must have a verb, otherwise they don’t communicate much to the reader.

Because verbs are the most important part of the sentence, they are something you must focus on when expanding the reaches of your word choice. Verbs are the most widely variegated units of language; the more “things” you can do in the world, the more verbs there are to describe them, making them great vehicles for both figurative language and vivid description.

Consider the following three sentences:

1. The road runs through the hills.
2. The road curves through the hills.
3. The road meanders through the hills.

Which sentence is the most descriptive? Though each of them has the same subject, object, and number of words, the third sentence creates the clearest image. The reader can visualize a road curving left and right through a hilly terrain, whereas the first two sentences require more thought to see clearly.

Finally, this resource on verb usage does a great job at highlighting how to invent and expand your verb choice.

Word Choice in Writing: Economy and Concision

Strong word choice means that every word you write packs a punch. As we’ve seen with adverbs above, you may find that your writing becomes more concise and economical—delivering more impact per word. Above all, you may find that you omit needless words.

Omit needless words is, in fact, a general order issued by Strunk and White in their classic Elements of Style. As they explain it:

Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts. This requires not that the writer make all his sentences short, or that he avoid all detail and treat his subjects only in outline, but that every word tell.

It’s worth repeating that this doesn’t mean your writing becomes clipped or terse, but simply that “every word tell.” As our word choice improves—as we omit needless words and express ourselves more precisely—our writing becomes richer, whether we write in long or short sentences.

As an example, here’s the opening sentence of a random personal essay from a high school test preparation handbook:

The world is filled with a numerous amount of student athletes that could somewhere down the road have a bright future.

Most words in this sentence are needless. It could be edited down to:

Many student athletes could have a bright future.

Now let’s take some famous lines from Shakespeare’s Macbeth. Can you remove a single word without sacrificing an enormous richness of meaning?

Out, out, brief candle!
Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.

In strong writing, every single word is chosen for maximum impact. This is the true meaning of concise or economical writing.

5 Word Choice Exercises to Sharpen Your Writing

With our word choice definition in mind, as well as our discussions of verb use and concision, let’s explore the following exercises to put theory into practice. As you play around with words in the following word choice exercises, be sure to consider meaning, specificity, style, and (if applicable) audience.

1. Build Moods With Word Choice

Writers fine-tune their words because the right vocabulary will build lush, emotive worlds. As you expand your word choice and consider the weight of each word, focus on targeting precise emotions in your descriptions and figurative language.

This kind of point is best illustrated through word choice examples. An example of magnificent language is the poem “In Defense of Small Towns” by Oliver de la Paz. The poem’s ambivalent feelings toward small hometowns presents itself through the mood of the writing.

The poem is filled with tense descriptions, like “animal deaths and toughened hay” and “breeches speared with oil and diesel,” which present the small town as stoic and masculine. This, reinforced by the terse stanzas and the rare “chances for forgiveness,” offers us a bleak view of the town; yet it’s still a town where everything is important, from “the outline of every leaf” to the weightless flight of cattail seeds.

The writing’s terse, heavy mood exists because of the poem’s juxtaposition of masculine and feminine words. The challenge of building a mood produces this poem’s gravity and sincerity.

Try to write a poem, or even a sentence, that evokes a particular mood through words that bring that word to mind. Here’s an example:

1. What mood do you want to evoke? flighty
2. What words feel like they evoke that mood? not sure, whatever, maybe, perhaps, tomorrow, sometimes, sigh
3. Try it in a sentence: “Maybe tomorrow we could see about looking at the lab results.” She sighed. “Perhaps.”

2. Invent New Words and Terms

A common question writers ask is, What is one way to revise for word choice? One trick to try is to make up new language in your revisions.

If you create language at a crucial moment, you might be able to highlight something that our current language can’t.

In the same way that unusual verbs highlight the action and style of your story, inventing words that don’t exist can also create powerful diction. Of course, your writing shouldn’t overflow with made-up words and pretentious portmanteaus, but if you create language at a crucial moment, you might be able to highlight something that our current language can’t.

A great example of an invented word is the phrase “wine-dark sea.” Understanding this invention requires a bit of history; in short, Homer describes the sea as “οἶνοψ πόντος”, or “wine-faced.” “Wine-dark,” then, is a poetic translation, a kind of kenning for the sea’s mystery.

Why “wine-dark” specifically? Perhaps because, like the sea, wine changes us; maybe the eyes of the sea are dark, as eyes often darken with wine; perhaps the sea is like a face, an inversion, a reflection of the self. In its endlessness, we see what we normally cannot.

Thus, “wine-dark” is a poetic combination of words that leads to intensive literary analysis. For a less historical example, I’m currently working on my poetry thesis, with pop culture monsters being the central theme of the poems. In one poem, I describe love as being “frankensteined.” By using this monstrous made-up verb in place of “stitched,” the poem’s attitude toward love is much clearer.

Try inventing a word or phrase whose meaning will be as clear to the reader as “wine-dark sea.” Here’s an example:

1. What do you want to describe? feeling sorry for yourself because you’ve been stressed out for a long time
2. What are some words that this feeling brings up? self-pity, sympathy, sadness, stress, compassion, busyness, love, anxiety, pity party, feeling sorry for yourself
3. What are some fun ways to combine these words? sadxiety, stresslove
4. Try it in a sentence: As all-nighter wore on, my anxiety softened into sadxiety: still edgy, but soft in the middle.

3. Only Use Words of Certain Etymologies

One of the reasons that the English language is so large and inconsistent is that it borrows words from every language. When you dig back into the history of loanwords, the English language is incredibly interesting!

(For example, many of our legal terms, such as judge, jury, and plaintiff, come from French. When the Normans [old French-speakers from Northern France] conquered England, their language became the language of power and nobility, so we retained many of our legal terms from when the French ruled the British Isles.)

Nerdy linguistics aside, etymologies also make for a fun word choice exercise. Try forcing yourself to write a poem or a story only using words of certain etymologies and avoiding others. For example, if you’re only allowed to use nouns and verbs that we borrowed from the French, then you can’t use Anglo-Saxon nouns like “cow,” “swine,” or “chicken,” but you can use French loanwords like “beef,” “pork,” and “poultry.”

Experiment with word etymologies and see how they affect the mood of your writing. You might find this to be an impactful facet of your word choice. You can Google “__ etymology” for any word to see its origin, and “__ synonym” to see synonyms.

Try writing a sentence only with roots from a single origin. (You can ignore common words like “the,” “a,” “of,” and so on.)

1. What do you want to write? The apple rolled off the table.
2. Try a first etymology: German: The apple wobbled off the bench.
3. Try a second: Latin: The russet fruit rolled off the table.

4. Write in E-Prime

E-Prime Writing describes a writing style where you only write using the active voice. By eschewing all forms of the verb “to be”—using words such as “is,” “am,” “are,” “was,” and other “being” verbs—your writing should feel more clear, active, and precise!

E-Prime not only removes the passive voice (“The bottle was picked up by James”), but it gets at the reality that many sentences using to be are weakly constructed, even if they’re technically in the active voice.

Of course, E-Prime writing isn’t the best type of writing for every project. The above paragraph is written in E-Prime, but stretching it out across this entire article would be tricky. The intent of E-Prime writing is to make all of your subjects active and to make your verbs more impactful. While this is a fun word choice exercise and a great way to create memorable language, it probably isn’t sustainable for a long writing project.

Try writing a paragraph in E-Prime:

1. What do you want to write? Of course, E-Prime writing isn’t the best type of writing for every project. The above paragraph is written in E-Prime, but stretching it out across this entire article would be tricky. The intent of E-Prime writing is to make all of your subjects active and to make your verbs more impactful. While this is a fun word choice exercise and a great way to create memorable language, it probably isn’t sustainable for a long writing project.
2. Converted to E-Prime: Of course, E-Prime writing won’t best suit every project. The above paragraph uses E-Prime, but stretching it out across this entire article would carry challenges. E-Prime writing endeavors to make all of your subjects active, and your verbs more impactful. While this word choice exercise can bring enjoyment and create memorable language, you probably can’t sustain it over a long writing project.

5. Write Blackout Poetry

Blackout poetry, also known as Found Poetry, is a visual creative writing project. You take a page from a published source and create a poem by blacking out other words until your circled words create a new poem. The challenge is that you’re limited to the words on a page, so you need a charged use of both space and language to make a compelling blackout poem.

Blackout poetry bottoms out our list of great word choice exercises because it forces you to consider the elements of word choice. With blackout poems, certain words might be read connotatively rather than denotatively, or you might change the meaning and specificity of a word by using other words nearby. Language is at its most fluid and interpretive in blackout poems!

For a great word choice example using blackout poetry, read “The Author Writes the First Draft of His Wedding Vows” by Hanif Willis-Abdurraqib. Here it is visually:

Pick a favorite poem of your own and make something completely new out of it using blackout poetry.

How to Expand Your Vocabulary

Vocabulary is a last topic in word choice. The more words in your arsenal, the better. Great word choice doesn’t rely on a large vocabulary, but knowing more words will always help! So, how do you expand your vocabulary?

The simplest way to expand your vocabulary is by reading.

The simplest answer, and the one you’ll hear the most often, is by reading. The more literature you consume, the more examples you’ll see of great words using the four elements of word choice.

Of course, there are also some great programs for expanding your vocabulary as well. If you’re looking to use words like “lachrymose” in a sentence, take a look at the following vocab builders:

• Dictionary.com’s Word-of-the-Day
• Vocabulary.com Games
• Merriam Webster’s Vocab Quizzes

Improve Your Word Choice With Writers.com’s Online Writing Courses

Looking for more writing exercises? Need more help choosing the right words? The instructors at Writers.com are masters of the craft. Take a look at our upcoming course offerings and join our community!

Princeton’s WordNetRate this definition:2.8 / 4 votes

1. choice, pick, selectionnoun

   the person or thing chosen or selected

   «he was my pick for mayor»

2. choice, selection, option, picknoun

   the act of choosing or selecting

   «your choice of colors was unfortunate»; «you can take your pick»

3. option, alternative, choiceadjective

   one of a number of things from which only one can be chosen

   «what option did I have?»; «there no other alternative»; «my only choice is to refuse»

4. choice, prime(a), prize, quality, selectadjective

   of superior grade

   «choice wines»; «prime beef»; «prize carnations»; «quality paper»; «select peaches»

5. choiceadjective

   appealing to refined taste

   «choice wine»

WiktionaryRate this definition:1.0 / 1 vote

1. choicenoun

   An option; a decision; an opportunity to choose or select something.

   Do I have a choice of what color to paint it?

2. choicenoun

   One selection or preference; that which is chosen or decided; the outcome of a decision.

   The ice cream sundae is a popular choice for dessert.

3. choicenoun

   Anything that can be chosen.

4. choicenoun

   The best or most preferable part.

5. choiceadjective

   Especially good or preferred.

   It’s a choice location, but you will pay more to live there.

6. choiceadjective

   Cool; excellent.

   Choice! I’m going to the movies.

7. Etymology: chois, from chois, from choisir, of origin (possibly via assumed *), from *, from kaus-, from keusanan, from ǵews-. Akin to kiosan, ceosan, kjósa. More at choose.

Samuel Johnson’s DictionaryRate this definition:0.0 / 0 votes

1. Choiceadjective

   Etymology: choisi, French.

   1. Select; of extraordinary value.

   After having set before the king the choicest of wines and fruits, told him the best part of his entertainment was to come.
   Guardian, №. 167.

   Thus in a sea of folly toss’d,
   My choicest hours of life are lost.
   Jonathan Swift.

   2. Chary; frugal; careful. Used of persons.

   He that is choice of his time, will also be choice of his company, and choice of his actions.
   Jeremy Taylor, Holy Living.

2. Choicenoun

   Etymology: choix, French.

   1. The act of choosing; determination between different things proposed; election.

   If you oblige me suddenly to chuse,
   The choice is made; for I must both refuse.
   John Dryden, Ind. Emp.

   Soft elocution doth thy style renown,
   Gentle or sharp, according to thy choice,
   To laugh at follies, or to lash at vice.
   John Dryden, Pers. sat. v.

   2. The power of choosing; election.

   Choice there is not, unless the thing which we take to be so in our power, that we might have refused it. If fire consume the stable, it chooseth not so to do, because the nature thereof is such that it can do no other.
   Richard Hooker, b. i. s. 7.

   There’s no liberty like the freedom of having it at my own choice, whether I will live to the world, or to myself.
   Roger L’Estrange.

   To talk of compelling a man to be good, is a contradiction; for where there is force, there can be no choice. Whereas all moral goodness consisteth in the elective act of the understanding will.
   Nehemiah Grew, Cosmol. b. iii. c. 2. s. 23.

   Whether he will remove his contemplation from one idea to another, is many times in his choice.
   John Locke.

   3. Care in choosing; curiosity of distinction.

   Julius Cæsar did write a collection of apophthegms: it is pity his book is lost; for I imagine they were collected with judgment and choice.
   Francis Bacon, Apophthegms.

   4. The thing chosen; the thing taken or approved, in preference to others.

   Your choice is not so rich in birth as beauty:
   That you might well enjoy her.
   William Shakespeare, Winter’s Tale.

   Take to thee, from among the cherubim,
   Thy choice of flaming warriors.
   John Milton, Par. Lost, b. xi.

   Now Mars, she said, let fame exalt her voice;
   Nor let thy conquests only be her choice.
   Matthew Prior.

   5. The best part of any thing, that is more properly the object of choice.

   The choice and flower of all things profitable in other books, the psalms do both more briefly contain, and more movingly also express.
   Richard Hooker, b. v. s. 37.

   Thou art a mighty prince: in the choice of our sepulchres bury thy dead.
   Gen. xxiii. 6.

   Their riders, the flow’r and choice
   Of many provinces, from bound to bound.
   John Milton, Par. Reg.

   6. Several things proposed at once, as objects of judgment and election.

   A braver choice of dauntless spirits,
   Did never float upon the swelling tide.
   William Shakespeare, K. John.

   7. To make Choice of. To choose; to take from several things proposed.

   Wisdom, of what herself approves, makes choice,
   Nor is led captive by the common voice.
   John Denham.

WikipediaRate this definition:4.0 / 1 vote

1. Choice

   Choice involves decision making. It can include judging the merits of multiple options and selecting one or more of them. One can make a choice between imagined options or between real options followed by the corresponding action. For example, a traveler might choose a route for a journey based on the preference of arriving at a given destination as soon as possible. The preferred (and therefore chosen) route can then follow from information such as the length of each of the possible routes, traffic conditions, etc. The arrival at a choice can include more complex motivators such as cognition, instinct, and feeling.
   Simple choices might include what to eat for dinner or what to wear on a Saturday morning – choices that have relatively low-impact on the chooser’s life overall. More complex choices might involve (for example) what candidate to vote for in an election, what profession to pursue, a life partner, etc. – choices based on multiple influences and having larger ramifications.
   Freedom of choice is generally cherished, whereas a severely limited or artificially restricted choice can lead to discomfort with choosing, and possibly an unsatisfactory outcome. In contrast, a choice with excessively numerous options may lead to confusion, reduced satisfaction, regret of the alternatives not taken, and indifference in an unstructured existence;
   and the illusion that choosing an object or a course, necessarily leads to the control of that object or course, can cause psychological problems.

Webster DictionaryRate this definition:2.0 / 2 votes

1. Choicenoun

   act of choosing; the voluntary act of selecting or separating from two or more things that which is preferred; the determination of the mind in preferring one thing to another; election

2. Choicenoun

   the power or opportunity of choosing; option

3. Choicenoun

   care in selecting; judgment or skill in distinguishing what is to be preferred, and in giving a preference; discrimination

4. Choicenoun

   a sufficient number to choose among

5. Choicenoun

   the thing or person chosen; that which is approved and selected in preference to others; selection

6. Choicenoun

   the best part; that which is preferable

7. Choice

   worthly of being chosen or preferred; select; superior; precious; valuable

8. Choice

   preserving or using with care, as valuable; frugal; — used with of; as, to be choice of time, or of money

9. Choice

   selected with care, and due attention to preference; deliberately chosen

FreebaseRate this definition:3.7 / 6 votes

1. Choice

   Choice consists of the mental process of judging the merits of multiple options and selecting one or more of them. While a choice can be made between imagined options, often a choice is made between real options and followed by the corresponding action. For example, a route for a journey is chosen based on the preference of arriving at a given destination as soon as possible. The preferred route is then derived from information about how long each of the possible routes take. This can be done by a route planner. If the preference is more complex, such as involving the scenery of the route, cognition and feeling are more intertwined, and the choice is less easy to delegate to a computer program or assistant.
   More complex examples include choosing a lifestyle, religious affiliation, or political position.
   Most people regard having choices as a good thing, though a severely limited or artificially restricted choice can lead to discomfort with choosing and possibly, an unsatisfactory outcome. In contrast, a choice with excessively numerous options may lead to confusion, regret of the alternatives not taken, and indifference in an unstructured existence; and the illusion that choosing an object or a course leads necessarily to control of that object or course can cause psychological problems.

Chambers 20th Century DictionaryRate this definition:0.0 / 0 votes

1. Choice

   chois, n. act or power of choosing: the thing chosen: alternative: preference: the preferable or best part.—adj. worthy of being chosen: select: appropriate.—adjs. Choice′-drawn (Shak.), selected with care; Choice′ful (Spens.), making many choices, fickle.—adv. Choice′ly, with discrimination or care.—n. Choice′ness, particular value: excellence: nicety.—Hobson’s choice, the alternative of a thing offered or nothing, from Hobson, a Cambridge carrier and innkeeper, who insisted on lending out the horse nearest the stable door, or none at all.—Make choice of, to select; Take one’s choice, to take what one wishes. [Fr. choix—choisir; cf. Choose.]

Editors ContributionRate this definition:1.0 / 1 vote

1. choice

   An option to choose.

   They knew they madd the right choice to marry each other as they both knew it was for life.

   Submitted by MaryC on January 24, 2020  

Suggested ResourcesRate this definition:4.0 / 1 vote

1. choice

   Song lyrics by choice — Explore a large variety of song lyrics performed by choice on the Lyrics.com website.

Surnames Frequency by Census RecordsRate this definition:0.0 / 0 votes

1. CHOICE

   According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Choice is ranked #14201 in terms of the most common surnames in America.

   The Choice surname appeared 2,114 times in the 2010 census and if you were to sample 100,000 people in the United States, approximately 1 would have the surname Choice.

   86% or 1,818 total occurrences were Black.
   6.9% or 146 total occurrences were White.
   2.8% or 61 total occurrences were of two or more races.
   2.6% or 56 total occurrences were of Hispanic origin.
   1.1% or 24 total occurrences were Asian.
   0.4% or 9 total occurrences were American Indian or Alaskan Native.

Matched Categories

1. • Action
   • Decision Making

British National Corpus

1. Spoken Corpus Frequency

   Rank popularity for the word ‘choice’ in Spoken Corpus Frequency: #820

2. Written Corpus Frequency

   Rank popularity for the word ‘choice’ in Written Corpus Frequency: #1036

3. Nouns Frequency

   Rank popularity for the word ‘choice’ in Nouns Frequency: #308

How to pronounce choice?

How to say choice in sign language?

Numerology

1. Chaldean Numerology

   The numerical value of choice in Chaldean Numerology is: 6

2. Pythagorean Numerology

   The numerical value of choice in Pythagorean Numerology is: 7

Examples of choice in a Sentence

1. Neil Saunders:

   What we will likely see is more limited choice and lower stock levels towards the end of the back to school period, some consumers will inevitably miss out on the things they want to purchase.

2. Nikhil Pahwa:

   When you are consciously choosing to not act on repeated violations, which are leading to harm, then it’s a choice you’re making, and somewhere law is going to catch up with you, the gap between responsibility and liability is going to get filled with regulation. And that’s what’s happening right now.

3. Anonymous:

   Happiness is a choice that requires effort at times.

4. John Mangudya:

   The Reserve Bank has directed all banking institutions not to provide banking services to facilitate any person or entity in dealing with or settling virtual currencies, the nature of cryptocurrency transactions make them the currency of choice for money launderers and other criminals.

5. Frances Rosales:

   [Pence] said he did his due diligence and looked at the law and how he applied. I believe that’s why he made the choice — I wouldn’t say he’s a coward.

Popularity rank by frequency of use

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Translations for choice

From our Multilingual Translation Dictionary

• الاختيار, اختيارArabic
• отбран, изборBulgarian
• triaCatalan, Valencian
• volba, možnostCzech
• dewisWelsh
• elite, valg, udsøgt, del, bedsteDanish
• erlesen, Auswahl, WahlGerman
• εκλογή, επιλογήGreek
• elektoEsperanto
• elección, exquisito, decisión, opción, selecciónSpanish
• valikEstonian
• aukeraBasque
• گزینه, برگزیده, پسند, برگزیده شدهPersian
• valinta, valikoimaFinnish
• choix, de choixFrench
• roghaIrish
• roghainn, taghadhScottish Gaelic
• מובחר, מובחרת, בחירה, ברירהHebrew
• पसंद, चुनावHindi
• választásHungarian
• ընտրությունArmenian
• pilihanIndonesian
• valIcelandic
• ottimo, ottima, sceltaItalian
• 選択, 最適, 選択肢Japanese
• არჩევაGeorgian
• 선택Korean
• ئاره‌زوو, هه‌ڵبژارده‌, بژاره‌, سه‌رتڵKurdish
• delectusLatin
• rinklus, šiurkštusLithuanian
• izveleLatvian
• whiringa, pūwharuMāori
• opsyen, pilihanMalay
• għażlaMaltese
• keuzemogelijkeheid, uitgelezen, keuzeDutch
• valgNorwegian
• wyborowy, wybórPolish
• seleto, escolhaPortuguese
• выборRussian
• izborSerbo-Croatian
• izbiraSlovene
• zgjedhjeAlbanian
• sortiment, utvald, prima, bäst, val, elit, alternativ, urval, utsöktSwedish
• ทางเลือกThai
• seçimTurkish
• sự quyết địnhVietnamese
• ברירהYiddish
• 选择Chinese

Get even more translations for choice »

Translation

Find a translation for the choice definition in other languages:

Select another language:

• — Select —
• 简体中文 (Chinese — Simplified)
• 繁體中文 (Chinese — Traditional)
• Español (Spanish)
• Esperanto (Esperanto)
• 日本語 (Japanese)
• Português (Portuguese)
• Deutsch (German)
• العربية (Arabic)
• Français (French)
• Русский (Russian)
• ಕನ್ನಡ (Kannada)
• 한국어 (Korean)
• עברית (Hebrew)
• Gaeilge (Irish)
• Українська (Ukrainian)
• اردو (Urdu)
• Magyar (Hungarian)
• मानक हिन्दी (Hindi)
• Indonesia (Indonesian)
• Italiano (Italian)
• தமிழ் (Tamil)
• Türkçe (Turkish)
• తెలుగు (Telugu)
• ภาษาไทย (Thai)
• Tiếng Việt (Vietnamese)
• Čeština (Czech)
• Polski (Polish)
• Bahasa Indonesia (Indonesian)
• Românește (Romanian)
• Nederlands (Dutch)
• Ελληνικά (Greek)
• Latinum (Latin)
• Svenska (Swedish)
• Dansk (Danish)
• Suomi (Finnish)
• فارسی (Persian)
• ייִדיש (Yiddish)
• հայերեն (Armenian)
• Norsk (Norwegian)
• English (English)

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One of the trickier concepts that you will be tested on ACT English is your ability to choose the right word from among many that are not quite right, and to spot when words are being used incorrectly.

Are you confident in your ability to find the differences in a group of similar words? Can you distinguish what’s needed from the context of a question?

If you’re not so sure, read on to see how the ACT English will test you on this skill! In this post, I’ll cover everything you need to know about these questions:

What Does “Diction” Mean, Anyway?

Diction is a fancy synonym for “word choice” — you may have heard your literature teacher talk about it when analyzing a famous author’s writing style. 

On the ACT English, there are three main ways that word choice becomes important:

• recognizing commonly confused words
• understanding meaning in context
• recognizing idiomatic uses of phrases with prepositions 

This final topic is large enough that we have a whole separate article dedicated to it.

But for the first two, let’s look at some example sentences that illustrate these concepts.

 

Answers: 1. B; 2. D

How did you do? These questions cover two of the most common types of diction errors that you will see on ACT English – commonly confused words and understanding meaning in context. Both of these test your ability to understand when a word is being used incorrectly. I’ll go into each of these question types in more detail below.

But first, let’s talk about why ACT English has diction errors in the first place.

ACT English basically tests your ability to be an editor. The ACT wants to see if you can spot and correct errors in short passages. This skill is important for college level work, such as writing papers.

Most of the ACT English questions focus on grammar, punctuation and style. By reading our guides or using another prep method, you can learn the various grammar rules that are important for being able to answer most of the questions on ACT English.

With diction questions, the ACT is looking to see which students can also spot errors where you can’t apply your grammar rules. The only way you will know these answers is to understand the subtle differences between similar words. 

If you don’t think this task sounds too difficult, keep in mind that many students make diction errors all the time in their everyday speech and writing. The makers of the ACT know which words are most confusing for students, and focus on these when writing the test.

So let’s start there – with the most commonly confused words that the ACT loves to test.

The Most Common Diction Errors

Some of the diction errors the ACT tests are random and therefore essentially impossible to study for.

However, the ACT writers have a couple of favorite errors, which usually appear at least once on every test. We’ll go through these one at a time.

THAN vs. THEN

The first key concept for diction questions is understanding the difference between “than” and “then.”

Than is used to show a comparison.

Then is used for showing what happens next.

Pop Quiz!

Look at the following pair of sentences. Can you tell which one is correct?

Answer: the second is correct because the sentence shows a comparison — than is needed.

How Should You Approach These Questions?

Then/than errors are pretty easy to spot and correct.

When you see one of these words underlined, look at the rest of the sentence. If it is comparing something, use “than.» If it is telling that one thing happened after another, use “then.”

Let’s look back at the first question

At the beginning of the article, I gave you the following question:

Now you can understand why the answer is (B) better than. The sentence shows a comparison (waking up and smelling coffee vs. waking up and doing anything else), so we need than.

HAVE vs. OF

The second most important diction pair to know is “have” and “of.»

The important distinction here is that “have” is a helping verb, while “of” is a preposition. If you see “of” being used as a helping verb, it will be incorrect!

The #1 Rule for Have/Of: 

If you see could of, would/will of, should of, or might of: these are all INCORRECT. 

Instead they should be could HAVE, would/will HAVE, should HAVE, and might HAVE.

This is one of those “everyday English” mistakes. In speaking, people tend to pronounce “have” like “of” because it’s faster and easier to say. It also sounds a lot like our contractions “would’ve,» “should’ve,» etc.

This has led some people to believe that “of” is actually the correct word to use in these circumstances — but it’s not!

Let’s look at some examples:

«Would of» is always incorrect; «would have» is the correct replacement.

How Should You Approach These Questions?

Have/of questions should also be very easy to spot if you’re looking for them. If you see of or have underlined, be ready to see a diction question.

Remember that if you have would/will of, might of, should of, or could of, you can immediately cross out those answers.

Choose an answer that replaces “of” with “have” and is also grammatically correct in the sentence.

Let’s look at an example from the ACT.

First thing we see in the answer choices are two answers that can automatically be crossed out, which makes our lives so much easier! Get rid of C and D, which both have the dreaded “of” construction.

Now it’s a matter of differentiating between “reveals” and “reveal.» At this point, you may notice that we are looking at a subject-verb agreement question. So we need to find what the subject is.

Ask yourself: what is doing the revealing? It’s the “last twenty years of letters.» When we cross out modifiers and the prepositional phrase, we get “last twenty years of letters.» Now it’s obvious that “years” is the subject.

Since “years” is a plural noun, we need the plural verb, which is “reveal.» B is the answer.

 

Other Easily Confused Words

The ACT will rarely test other commonly-confused words. These questions are very difficult to predict because they happen quite infrequently.

I have included a list of commonly confused words at the end of this article. Try reading through them and see if there are any that surprise you or that you didn’t know.

If so, it wouldn’t hurt to make sure you have these down before you take the test.

But don’t bother spending a lot of time worrying about this list. The ACT will rarely test this kind of question, so it’s really not worth stressing out over. 

You will most often see these commonly confused words in the context of our next type of question, which is….

Understanding Word Meaning in Context 

Instead of using really tricky commonly confused words, the ACT usually uses fairly common words with similar meanings, and asks you to choose which one is best for the sentence.

This can be tricky because you have to really think about what the differences are between the different words that you’re given, and also understand what the sentence needs in order to most correctly complete it.

Let’s look at an example of this type of problem from the ACT:

This example shows how the ACT uses relatively simple words to try to trick you. You are probably familiar with all of the words in the answer choices, so let’s look at them closely to see which one best fits the sentence.

All of the words here imply some sort of contrast or conflict, but in very different ways.

Let’s start with the given word, “contest.» A contest implies some form of formal competition between two things. Though the author says that there are differences between American and Korean age counting traditions, he doesn’t imply that they were actually in competition with each other. So (A) is out.

Let’s look at (B). “Change” implies that something was one way, and then became another way. This doesn’t work because these traditions haven’t changed from one to the other — they were just different to begin with. So (B) is out.

(C) is quite similar to (A), in that “dispute,» like “contest,» shows a direct conflict between two things. Again, this doesn’t really work because the two traditions aren’t actually competing with each other.

That leaves us with (D), which is the only answer that makes sense. As we’ve said, the two traditions aren’t having a fight; they contrast simply because they have different characteristics. That means that (D), “differences,» is the most appropriate answer.

 

How Should You Approach These Questions?

The meaning in context questions are definitely the trickiest of the diction questions. To spot them, look for questions that have an underlined word and answer choices that are completely different words, but are loosely related in meaning.

First, read through the sentence. Try to place a word of your own in the spot of the underlined word.

Now look at the answer choices. Though they will be slightly similar words, they will have different meanings. Which of them can have the meaning most like the word you put into the sentence? Choose that as the answer.

Let’s look at this example from the ACT and use the above strategy to answer it.

First, let’s read through the sentence and try to see what should go in the blank. “Perhaps the celebration of New Year’s Day in Korean culture is _______ because it is thought of as everyone’s birthday party.”

Something along the lines of “made more important” makes sense here. So which word could mean that?

You’ll notice that almost all the words imply going up in one way or another — this is how the ACT is trying to trick you. But in the right context, one of them can also mean showing greater importance.

“Raised” and “lifted” both refer to physically moving something up (unless they are paired with other words — not the case here). So (B) and (C) are out.

“Lighted” is thrown in here to trick you and is quite different to the others — its means something has been made lighter, as in the opposite of darker. It doesn’t work at all, so (D) is out.

Therefore the best word is the one the sentence started out with. If you look up “heighten”, you will see it can mean to physically raise something up, but it can also mean to make something more intense or significant, which is close to the original idea we came up with, which was making something more important.

 

Looking Back

The second question I gave you about smelling coffee in the morning had one of these meaning in context errors. Take a second look at the question.

Though the answer choices are all vaguely related – they all imply something that excites or surprises in some way – the correct answer is “stimulating”. This is the only word that really implies something that helps wake you up, which is what is needed to correctly complete the sentence.

Quick Recap

To summarize, here are the key strategies you need to use to master diction questions on ACT English: 

1. “Of” used as a helping verb (would of, should of) is always incorrect. Choose an answer that replaces it with “have.»
2. Use “than” for sentences with comparisons.
3. Use “then” to show one thing happening after another.
4. When you see a meaning in context question, first read through the sentence and mentally replace the word with one that makes sense in the sentence. Choose the answer that comes closest to the word you used.

Now It’s Your Turn!

Read the following passage and answer the questions that follow.

1. A; 2. C; B.; 4. C; 5. B

List of Commonly Confused Words

WORD	MEANING	WORD	MEANING
accept	to receive, take	except	excluding
access	entrance; opportunity	excess	more than needed
addition	something added	edition	a certain production of something
adopt	to legally take on, accept	adapt	to change to be more suitable
advice	a recommendation	advise	to give a recommendation
adverse	bad; unfavorable	averse	opposed to
affect	to influence	effect	a result
afflict	to cause suffering	inflict	to force something harmful
aisle	space between rows	isle	island
allude	to make an indirect reference	elude	to avoid
allusion	an indirect reference	illusion	a false idea or vision
already	happened before now	all ready	to be entirely prepared
altar	table for religious ceremony	alter	to change
altogether	completely; entirely	all together	all things with each other
a lot	a large number of something	allot	to give out an amount of something
ambivalent	to have two different feelings about something	ambiguous	having more than one possible meaning
amoral	having no sense or right and wrong	immoral	having intentionally bad morals
anecdote	a short personal story	antidote	a substance or activity that stops something bad
angel	a spiritual creature	angle	space between intersecting lines measured in degrees
apart	separated, into pieces	a part	a piece of something
appraise	to examine and judge	apprise	to tell someone of something
are	3rd person plural of “to be”	our	belonging to us
accent	how someone pronounces words	ascent	movement up
		assent	agreement/approval
assistance	help	assistants	helpers
attribute	a quality/characteristic	contribute	to give something
auditory	related to hearing	audible	able to be heard
aural	related to hearing	oral	spoken, or related to the mouth
balmy	pleasantly warm	barmy	crazy or silly
bare	not covered	bear	to carry or accept something
bated	in suspense, excited	baited	to harass (past tense)
bazaar	a market	bizarre	very strange and surprising
berth	a bed on a boat/train	birth	time when a baby is born
beside	next to something	besides	in addition to something
boar	a wild pig	bore	a dull person
board	a long, flat piece of wood	bored	feeling uninterested
born	to have been birthed	borne	carried
bough	a large branch of a tree	bow	bend upper body forward
breath	air that comes from lunch	breathe	to take air in and out
brake	part of a vehicle that stops it	break	to separate into pieces
buy	to purchase	by	shows a person who does something
canvas	a strong cloth	canvass	to ask people their opinions
censure	to criticize formally	censor	to remove offensive things from public
capital	city where government is based, or money	capitol	state legislature building
choose	to decide or pick	chose	past tense of choose
climactic	an important or exciting time	climatic	relating to the weather
coarse	rough and thick	course	a series of lessons
collaborate	to work together	corroborate	to provide supporting information
command	to order	commend	to praise
complacent	feeling you don’t need to try hard	complaisant	willingness to please others
complement	something that goes well with something else	compliment	saying something to show praise
comprehensive	thorough	comprehensible	easy to understand
conscience	the part of you that makes you feel guilty	conscious	aware; awake
contemptuous	showing contempt	contemptible	extremely bad
corps	a group of people or military force	corpse	a dead body
council	an elected group of people	counsel	to give advice
credible	able to be believed	credulous	gullible
dairy	milk products	diary	a book of personal thoughts
descent	a movement down	dissent	disagreement
desirous	wanting something	desirable	attractive
dessert	sweet food	desert	hot, dry area
device	equipment used for a particular purpose	devise	to design or invent something
discreet	secretive	discrete	separate and different
disinterested	impartial	uninterested	not interested
do	a helping verb	dew	drops of water
		due	expected or planned
dominant	most important or wanting control	dominate	to control or have power over
die	to stop living	dye	substance used to change color
dyeing	to change the color of	dying	present participle of “die”
elicit	to get info or a reaction from someone	illicit	not legal
eminent	respected	imminent	about to happen
		immanent	permanent part of something
emit	to send out gas/heat/light	omit	exclude
envelop	cover something	envelope	what letters go in
everyday	commonplace	every day	each day
exhaustive	comprehensive	exhausting	tiring
expandable	gets bigger	expendable	non-essential
explicit	clear, detailed	implicit	implied or suggested
fair	reasonable	fare	cost
farther	more distant (physical distance)	further	more
flaunt	exaggerate	flout	intentionally break the rules
formally	properly	formerly	before
foreboding	apprehension or anxiety	forbidding	unfriendly or hostile
forth	forwards	fourth	first, second, third…..
gorilla	large monkey	guerrilla	unofficial military group
hear	percieving sound	here	in this place or moment
heard	percieved sound (past tense of hear)	herd	flock/gaggle/group
hoard	collect/store	horde	large group
hole	hollow space in something	whole	complete
human	people/person	humane	kind
implicit	implied or suggested	complicit	involved in
imply	suggest	implicate	suggest someone is involved in something
		infer	guess something based on the information you have
incur	cause unpleasant consequences to oneself	occur	to happen
indeterminate	uncertain or unclear	interminable	lasting a long time, in a boring way
influence	impact	affluence	wealth
ingenious	really clever	ingenuous	innocent and trusting
its	belongs to	it’s	it is
knew	past tense of «know»	new	not old
know	to be aware of something	no	a denial
laid	past tense of lay	lain	past tense of lie
later	occuring further along in time	latter	near the end of a period
lay	to put something down	lie	to recline horizontally
lead	to take charge	led	had taken charge
lessen	to reduce or decrease	lesson	what a teacher teaches
lightning	weather	lightening	becoming lighter or brighter
loose	not tight	lose	to not win
maybe	an adverb that means «perhaps»	may be	a verb phrase indicating that something could happen but is not certain
meat	flesh	meet	assemble
mete	administer a punishment
metal	hard, shiny substance	medal	metal object given as a prize
		mettle	courage, strength, or fortitude
miner	someone who works in a mine	minor	not important; underage person
moral	right and wrongs	morale	confidence level in the success of an endeavor
passed	to go by something; alternatively, to qualify	past	something that’s happened before now
patience	to stay calm	patients	sick people
peace	tranquility	piece	a part of
peak	the top	peek	a quick look
		pique	annoyance
pedal	foot operated part of machine	petal	part of a flower
		peddle	to sell
perpetrate	do something bad	perpetuate	to sustain or preserve something
personal	relating to a person	personnel	staff
persecute	oppress or abuse	prosecute	to take legal action against someone
perspective	viewpoint	prospective	potential buyer, or applying to the future
plain	ordinary, unremarkable	plane	flying vehicle
pore	small hole, esp. in the skin	pour	make liquid flow from a container
precede	to happen before something else	proceed	to go forward
precedent	an example or model	president	the head of
prescribe	recommend or authorize medical treatment	proscribe	to forbid
presence	being in a place	presents	gifts
principal	most important	principle	fundamental rule
quiet	no noise	quite	completely
rain	precipitation	reign	to rule
		rein	straps that control a horse
raise	to lift	raze	completely destroy
rational	reasonable	rationale	the reason
reluctant	unwilling	reticent	saying little about what you feel
respectfully	showing respect	respectively	in the same order
reverend	Christian official	reverent	showing respect
right	correct	rite	traditional religious ceremony
		write	produce words
road	surface built for vehicles	rode	to have ridden
scene	location or site	seen	to have looked
sense	feeling or awareness of something; one of the 5 senses	since	between the past and now; because
sensible	practical or realistic	sensitive	delicate; responsive
		sensory	connected to the physical senses
sight	vision	site	a place
		cite	mention something as proof
simulate	to mimic	stimulate	to activate or energize a process
stationary	unmoving; still	stationery	office supplies, esp. paper
straight	not curved	strait	narrow waterway or channel connecting two bodies of water
suppose	assume or presume	supposed to	expected to do something
taught	educated, instructed	taut	stretched very tight
than	used to compare two things	then	at that time
their	belongs to them	there	at that place or location
		they’re	they are
through	from one end to the other	threw	to have thrown
		thorough	completely
to	preposition used to describe a definition or identify the object of something	too	as well as
		two	comes after one
track	narrow path	tract	large area of land
visual	relating to seeing	visible	able to seen
waist	around the middle of your body	waste	a bad use of something
waive	give up or cede	wave	move hand from side to side
weak	not strong	week	7 days
weather	conditions in the air above the earth (wind, rain etc)	whether	if, or not
		wether	a castrated ram
where	to, at, or in what place	were	past tense of «to be»
which	determining pronoun	witch	woman with magical powers
whose	pronoun identifying what belongs to someone	who’s	who is
your	belonging to you	you’re	you are
		yore	a long time ago

What’s Next?

Now that you know how to tackle one of the trickier subjects on the ACT English, try another: here is how to take on idioms on the ACT.

Not sure what else you’ll be up against? Here is a full breakdown of what you will find on ACT English.

Aiming high? Here are some top tips to get a 36 on ACT English.

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The words a writer chooses are the building materials from which he or she constructs any given piece of writing—from a poem to a speech to a thesis on thermonuclear dynamics. Strong, carefully chosen words (also known as diction) ensure that the finished work is cohesive and imparts the meaning or information the author intended. Weak word choice creates confusion and dooms a writer’s work either to fall short of expectations or fail to make its point entirely.

Factors That Influence Good Word Choice

When selecting words to achieve the maximum desired effect, a writer must take a number of factors into consideration:

• Meaning: Words can be chosen for either their denotative meaning, which is the definition you’d find in a dictionary or the connotative meaning, which is the emotions, circumstances, or descriptive variations the word evokes.
• Specificity: Words that are concrete rather than abstract are more powerful in certain types of writing, specifically academic works and works of nonfiction. However, abstract words can be powerful tools when creating poetry, fiction, or persuasive rhetoric.
• Audience: Whether the writer seeks to engage, amuse, entertain, inform, or even incite anger, the audience is the person or persons for whom a piece of work is intended.
• Level of Diction: The level of diction an author chooses directly relates to the intended audience. Diction is classified into four levels of language:

1. Formal which denotes serious discourse
2. Informal which denotes relaxed but polite conversation
3. Colloquial which denotes language in everyday usage
4. Slang which denotes new, often highly informal words and phrases that evolve as a result sociolinguistic constructs such as age, class, wealth status, ethnicity, nationality, and regional dialects.

• Tone: Tone is an author’s attitude toward a topic. When employed effectively, tone—be it contempt, awe, agreement, or outrage—is a powerful tool that writers use to achieve a desired goal or purpose.
• Style: Word choice is an essential element in the style of any writer. While his or her audience may play a role in the stylistic choices a writer makes, style is the unique voice that sets one writer apart from another.

The Appropriate Words for a Given Audience

To be effective, a writer must choose words based on a number of factors that relate directly to the audience for whom a piece of work is intended. For example, the language chosen for a dissertation on advanced algebra would not only contain jargon specific to that field of study; the writer would also have the expectation that the intended reader possessed an advanced level of understanding in the given subject matter that at a minimum equaled, or potentially outpaced his or her own.

On the other hand, an author writing a children’s book would choose age-appropriate words that kids could understand and relate to. Likewise, while a contemporary playwright is likely to use slang and colloquialism to connect with the audience, an art historian would likely use more formal language to describe a piece of work about which he or she is writing, especially if the intended audience is a peer or academic group.

«Choosing words that are too difficult, too technical, or too easy for your receiver can be a communication barrier. If words are too difficult or too technical, the receiver may not understand them; if words are too simple, the reader could become bored or be insulted. In either case, ​the message falls short of meeting its goals . . . Word choice is also a consideration when communicating with receivers for whom English is not the primary language [who] may not be familiar with colloquial English.»

(From «Business Communication, 8th Edition,» by A.C. Krizan, Patricia Merrier, Joyce P. Logan, and Karen Williams. South-Western Cengage, 2011)

Word Selection for Composition

Word choice is an essential element for any student learning to write effectively. Appropriate word choice allows students to display their knowledge, not just about English, but with regard to any given field of study from science and mathematics to civics and history.

The challenge for teachers of composition is to help students understand the reasoning behind the specific word choices they’ve made and then letting the students know whether or not those choices work. Simply telling a student something doesn’t make sense or is awkwardly phrased won’t help that student become a better writer. If a student’s word choice is weak, inaccurate, or clichéd, a good teacher will not only explain how they went wrong but ask the student to rethink his or her choices based on the given feedback.

Word Choice for Literature

Arguably, choosing effective words when writing literature is more complicated than choosing words for composition writing. First, a writer must consider the constraints for the chosen discipline in which they are writing. Since literary pursuits as such as poetry and fiction can be broken down into an almost endless variety of niches, genres, and subgenres, this alone can be daunting. In addition, writers must also be able to distinguish themselves from other writers by selecting a vocabulary that creates and sustains a style that is authentic to their own voice.

When writing for a literary audience, individual taste is yet another huge determining factor with regard to which writer a reader considers a «good» and who they may find intolerable. That’s because «good» is subjective. For example, William Faulker and Ernest Hemmingway were both considered giants of 20th-century American literature, and yet their styles of writing could not be more different. Someone who adores Faulkner’s languorous stream-of-consciousness style may disdain Hemmingway’s spare, staccato, unembellished prose, and vice versa.