Affect Vs Effect
The words affect and effect are commonly misused and abused in essays. For a hand written test, you may be able to fudge your hand writing a little bit to make the first letter look like both an a and an e at the same time to confuse your teacher, but you cannot do that in a typed essay. You could also use a different word entirely to avoid having to choose, but it is better to know the difference. After reading this blog, hopefully you will be able to make a more confident decision between these two vowels.
As a general rule, people use affect as a verb that means ‘to influence’ something or ‘to act in a way that you don’t feel.’ People use effect as a noun to mean ‘the result’ of a situation. In the picture below, for example, you would negatively affect your friend if you pushed them into the pool. The fact that your friend is now in the pool is the effect of your action.
As another example, lightening affects the tree that it strikes, but a burnt tree is the effect of a lightning strike.
As a basic rule, try to think about whether or not you want to use the word to describe an action or the result of the action. After that, you just have to remember which vowel goes with which meaning. Perhaps think of affect as an action and effect as an event.
Beyond these basic meanings, affect and effect can be a little tricky. Affect can be used as a noun to describe the mood that a person has. For example, a person might say that their brother displayed a happy affect. Not to get too confusing but effect can also be used as a verb to discuss accomplishing a task or bringing about change. For example, the presidential candidates hope that they will be able to effect change in the United States if they are elected.
Essentially, affect is used as a verb and effect is used as a noun except in a few special scenarios that do not occur very often.
~ Melanie Friese
Melanie Friese is a senior at Southern New Hampshire University and the lead Writing tutor in The Learning Center. She likes to correct grammar mistakes on television news stations and periodicals in her spare time. Come see her during walk-in tutoring this fall!