To “affect” a change would be to alter the change itself, for example if the university had already been reviewing its portfolio then the protesters might be affecting the change by making it happen more quickly.
To “effect” a change would be to cause the change in the first place.
This is one of the few oddities of the English language that I struggle with constantly. It seems like, as a native speaker, most of the other ones just “feel” or “sound” right, but I haven’t been able to nail that down with effect/affect for some reason
The trouble is that both words have a verb sense and a noun sense.
The noun sense of affect is something like “mood” or “emotion” and isn’t used often, while the noun sense of effect is “thing that happened (because of some cause)” and is a rather common word.
The verb sense of affect is “to cause something to happen (to something)” and is a pretty common word, while the verb sense of effect is more like “to make something be true” as in “effecting change” above.
The mnemonic I use is from dungeons and dragons, some spells are “mind-affecting effects” meaning they change minds and they’re caused by the spell being cast.
Thank you for spelling effecting correctly.
Isn’t effect a noun, affect a verb? Am I supposed to discern which in other ways?
To “affect” a change would be to alter the change itself, for example if the university had already been reviewing its portfolio then the protesters might be affecting the change by making it happen more quickly.
To “effect” a change would be to cause the change in the first place.
This is one of the few oddities of the English language that I struggle with constantly. It seems like, as a native speaker, most of the other ones just “feel” or “sound” right, but I haven’t been able to nail that down with effect/affect for some reason
The trouble is that both words have a verb sense and a noun sense.
The noun sense of affect is something like “mood” or “emotion” and isn’t used often, while the noun sense of effect is “thing that happened (because of some cause)” and is a rather common word.
The verb sense of affect is “to cause something to happen (to something)” and is a pretty common word, while the verb sense of effect is more like “to make something be true” as in “effecting change” above.
The mnemonic I use is from dungeons and dragons, some spells are “mind-affecting effects” meaning they change minds and they’re caused by the spell being cast.
If I use my Persuasion skill to help someone think their way through a problem, is that a “mind-effecting affect”?
I don’t know that I’d say persuasion skills are an affect, but if your mood gives people ideas, that’d work.
I hope to effect a change in your perspective.
“Effect” can also be used as a verb, as used above.
Both can be both nouns and verbs. This to me is the most annoying English oddity of all.
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