Adverse and Averse are two adjectives that have different meanings, though they are closely related. Adverse can describe any negative situation; however, averse describes a person who wishes to avoid something. Adverse can only be used to describe situations and forces, not people or ideas, for example: Correct: Does this medication have any adverse effects?Correct: The adverse […]

The spellings Adviser and Advisor are both fully acceptable, though your spellchecker may say otherwise. Most spellcheckers do not tolerate multiple spellings, but feel free to ignore them in this case. It may help to know that there are reasons for these two spellings. One reason is that, in English, we can change almost any […]

Definition of Avert: To turn attention to   Definition of Advert: To turn something away Avert and Advert are both verbs in their neutral forms, and have opposite meanings. Advert means “to turn attention to” and avert means “to turn something away”: The teacher adverted our attention to the lesson on the board.We averted our eyes when the violence […]

Affect and Effect, which can be verbs or nouns, are often mixed up by English speakers because their meanings do overlap—and change in confusing ways between the noun and verb versions. What I mean is that when you affect something, you create an effect. And when you effect something, you also create an effect in a […]

Affectation and Affection are both nouns, relating to the noun affect, which means, basically, “emotion.” This meaning is clear with affection, which means “fondness” or “loving behavior”: She showed her cat so much affection that the animal became spoiled and demanding. An affectation, however, is completely different! An affectation is a behavior, or pattern of behavior, […]