America's Grammar and Spelling Acumen

Going Back to Grammar School

It doesn’t matter whether you’re an English teacher, a crossword puzzle genius, or even if you have a college degree, human error is part of life. This becomes even more evident as we see that the average quiz grade of survey respondents was the equivalent of a D. Only roughly 16% scored 90 points or higher, which is equivalent to a letter grade of an A or A-.

Even though one of 2019’s top five most popular online college majors was Communications and Media, which incorporates many of the same teachings as an English major, people are still misusing words and phrases on a regular basis. What’s worse is that some might not even realize their mistakes.

Who Made the Grade?

Although the average test scores were relatively low across the board regardless of gender, age, politics, and other defining characteristics, there are a few differences that stand out.

For example, respondents who leisurely read a book within one month of taking the survey scored much higher than those who hadn’t read for entertainment in the past two to five months. Reading is essentially exercise for our brains. By reading more, we are building muscle within the brain to increase its potential to absorb and retain information. People who read more are constantly exposing themselves to words and phrases outside of their everyday conversations. Research has shown that people learn about 5% to 15% of all the words they know through reading.

There was also a noticeable difference between the scores of men and women – female respondents generally scored higher. Women are said to be better at remembering verbal information, such as words and sentences, and therefore may have a better understanding of what’s grammatically correct versus incorrect.

The largest gap between scores occurred between respondents with differing political affiliations. Biden supporters scored an average of a C, while Trump supporters’ overall score fell well below failing.

Easy Street

There were some questions that the majority of respondents all guessed accurately, e.g., identifying the correct usage of where versus wear, and queue versus cue. These two, specifically, were answered correctly by over 90% of respondents. It could be that because these words, and the way they were phrased on the quiz, are more standard in normal conversation, and respondents could use context clues if they did not already know the answer.

The hardest phrase, however, proved to be “in regard to.” Over half of respondents believed the word ‘regard’ to be plural, providing their answer as ‘regards.’

Getting Schooled

There are some people who never fail to take advantage of a moment to correct someone’s grammar. Those “grammar police” can get frustrated when they hear other people speak incorrectly while in conversation (or sometimes just within earshot). What’s interesting, though, is that the respondents who said they get extremely frustrated by this, actually scored the lowest on their grammar quiz. Those who got the highest scores were rarely annoyed by this at all.

Men are corrected more than women, and those whose scores were the lowest reported being very frequently corrected on their grammar by others.

Which State Said It Best

We’ve seen how gender, age, and determinants like political affiliation and frequency of reading affected respondents’ scores, and now we look to where these respondents reside. Overall, people who live in Midwestern states scored the highest, a C average, while West Coast residents failed, scoring less than 60%.

While we did find that certain factors played a part in who scored better, it’s safe to say that people are still finding themselves confused by certain words and phrases in the English language. In the end, there are some grammatical scenarios that the majority of people do recognize and know well, but, overall, there remain many language situations that continue to confuse even the best of us.