With this chief difference of action and consequence between affect vs. See how effect is delivering a consequence in each case: ‘the effect of his decisions,’ and the ‘effects of her behavior in the past.’ Let’s look at examples of effect in a sentence: However, when you talk about consequences or an upshot – a side effect, immediate effect, any negative effects, personal effects, and so on – resort to using effect as a noun here.

Note that in both the cases, affect is used as an action word: ‘decisions affect her life’ and ‘behavior in the past affect the future’ To elaborate, when something acts or leaves an effect (crazy, I know 🙄), you’ll use affect. Ideally, you now know that the chief difference between affect and effect lies in one being a verb and another being a noun (typically). In the end, we’ll leave you with mnemonics or ways to remember the difference (nope, you don’t need to reference a thesaurus ). In this post, we’ll dig into the difference between affect and effect and how to use the two in sentences. Only a minor difference here in the emphasis on the ‘a’ and ‘e.’ In this case, you’d pronounce effect as ɪˈfɛkt and affect as æfekt. The challenge surfaces because effect and affect are homophones in English language – words that have similar pronunciation, but different meanings. Most people (including myself) have trouble or have had trouble trying to figure out which to use when.

Honestly, you’re not alone when it comes to the challenge that effect vs. And, when there’s action involved and you need a verb, affect is the word to go with. But a good starting point is to remember that when you need a noun, use effect. We’ll get to the nitty-gritty of the usage details below. effect, remember this: affect is a verb and effect is a noun.

Has that effect on me