2022-01-30
ศัพท์ น่าสับสน - Set – C - criterion & criteria
แนะนำการใช้ ตามที่ส่วนใหญ่ใช้ แต่ละท้องถิ่น
ความหมาย อาจผันแปร ตาม ตำแหน่ง/หน้าที่ ในประโยค
Dictionary of Problem Words and Expressions:
criterion & criteria
Meaning “standard, rule, or test for forming a judgement of decision,”
criterion (krai-TEER-ee-uhn) is singular in form and meaning.
The plural criteria (krai-TEER-ee-uh) cannot be used for criterion
in such expressions as
“a criteria,” “one criterion.”
Criterions is a less-preferred but acceptable plural.
“One criterion for success is hard work.”
“The criteria in judging the papers will be neatness, thoroughness, and length.”
Common Errors in English Usage Dictionary:
criterion & criteria
There are several words with Latin or Greek roots
whose plural forms ending in A
are constantly mistaken for singular ones.
See, for instance, data and media.
You can haveone criterion or many criteria.
Don’t confuse them.
Dictionary.com:
USAGE NOTE FOR CRITERION
Like some other nouns
borrowed from the Greek,
criterion has both a Greek plural, criteria,
and a plural formed on the English pattern, criterions.
However, the -s plural is rarely used;
the plural ending in -a is the usual form:
These are the criteria for the selection of candidates.
Though criteria is properly a plural noun,
it is increasingly used as a singular noun,
most often in speech but also occasionally in edited prose:
One criteria is that the candidate must be over 18.
This use of criteria as a singular noun
is generally considered incorrect.
Dictionary.com:
MORE ABOUT CRITERION
What does criterion mean?
A criterion is a standard or principle
for judging, evaluating, or selecting something.
It’s an ideal or requirement on which
the judgment, evaluation, or selection is based.
The plural of criterion can be criteria or criterions,
but criterions is rarely used.
A criterion is often
a certain requirementthat someone or something must meet
in order to be considered or qualify for something.
An applicant for a job may be evaluated based on several criteria, including their education, experience, and references
—each one of these standards is a criterion.
Your grade in a class may be based on certain criteria,
such as your test scores, your grades on homework and other assignments, and your participation in class.
Similarly, a gymnast’s score is based on several criteria
involving how well they performed certain moves.
The word criteria is often used with the word meet,
as in Your entry meets all of our criteria for inclusion in the exhibit.
Sometimes, people try to use criteria as a singular noun
(like how data is sometimes used),
but this is generally considered not the right way to use it.
Example:
We assess the candidates based on several criteria,
and one criterion is that they must have
at least five years of experience in a similar position.
Where does criterion come from?
The first records of the word criterion come from the early 1600s.
It comes from the Greek kritḗrion, meaning “a standard,” from kritēs, “judge,” from krinein, “to decide.”
The word critic and related words
like critical and criticism are based on the same root.
The word criterion is always used
in the context of some kind of decision, judgment, or evaluation.
But it’s not only used in official or formal situations.
For example,
when shopping for a new TV, you may have several criteria
for selecting one that include things
like how big it is and how much it costs.
The word criterion appears
in the name of the Criterion Collection,
a collection of films that are selected
because they are thought to be important and
to meet a certain standard of cinematic excellence.
Dictionary.com:
MORE ABOUT CRITERIA
What does criteria mean?
Criteria is the plural of criterion
—a standard or principle for judging, evaluating, or selecting something.
Criteria are the ideals or requirements
on which a judgment, evaluation, or selection is based.
The plural of criterion can also be criterions,
but this is rarely used.
Criteria are often the particular requirements
that someone or something must meet in order to be
considered or qualify for something.
An applicant for a job may be evaluated based on several criteria,
including their education, experience, and references
—each one of these standards is a criterion.
Your grade in a class may be based on certain criteria,
such as your test scores, your grades on homework
and other assignments, and your participation in class.
Similarly, a gymnast’s score is based on several criteria
involving how well they performed certain moves.
The word criteria is often used with the word meet,
as in Your entry meets all of our criteria for inclusion in the exhibit.
Sometimes, people try to use criteria as a singular noun
(like how data is sometimes used),
but this is generally considered not the right way to use it.
Example:
We assess the candidates based on several criteria, and one criterion is that they must have at least five years of experience in a similar position.
Merriam-Webster Dictionary:
Is criteria singular or plural?: Usage Guide
The plural criteria has been used as a singular for over half a century.
let me now return to the third criteria
— R. M. Nixon that really is the criteria — Bert Lance
Many of our examples, like the two foregoing, are taken from speech.
But singular criteria is not uncommon in edited prose,
and its use both in speech and writing seems to be increasing.
Only time will tell whether it will reach
the unquestioned acceptability of agenda.
Did you know?
One person's principal criterion
for a new car may be its gas mileage,
while someone else's may be whether it has room for four children.
When filling a job opening,
employers usually look for several criteria
(notice the plural form) in the applicants;
and when college admissions officers are reading student applications,
they likewise always keep a few basic criteria in mind.
And when interviewing an applicant,
one criterion for both the employer and the admissions officer
might include the size of the applicant's vocabulary!
Merriam-Webster Dictionary:
Usage Notes
Can ‘Criteria’ Ever Be Singular?
It depends on what you base your decision.
What to Know
Criteria is typically a plural noun referring
to standards on which a judgment can be made.
Its singular is criterion,
but evidence shows that
criteria is frequently being used as a singular as well as a plural,
much like data and agenda
and their lesser-used singulars datum and agendum.
As English borrows words from Latin and Greek,
we sometimes must adjust our grammar to accommodate
how those words were used in their original languages.
This is particularly true with regard to plural nouns.
Early English grammarians preferred to preserve
the traditions of the classical languages,
so Latin- and Greek-derived nouns often retained
their Latin and Greek plural forms in English.
This practice was retained particularly for
academic and scientific writing.
So the plural of
radius is radii;
appendix is appendices;
genus is genera;
bacterium becomes bacteria.
But in many other instances,
the Latin or Greek plural was abandoned for the standard English plural.
The Latin plural of gymnasium is gymnasia,
but you would almost never see it pluralized
as anything other than gymnasiums in English.
There are numerous counterexamples.
One is criterion, a word whose Greek plural is very much alive: criteria.
Usage of 'Criterion' and 'Criteria'
Criterion is defined as
“a standard on which a judgment or decision may be based” or
“a characterizing mark or trait.”
The former of these is the meaning in question
when one says,
“An important criterion for choosing where to dine
is that there are vegetarian entrees on the menu.”
'Criteria' as a Singular Noun
There is evidence that criteria is following the pattern of other
Latin- and Greek-derived nouns
that have shown a preference
for the plural form in constructions
that otherwise would seem to call for the singular
(such as a singular article
or being a subject paired with a singular verb such as is):
Our word data, for example, began its life in English
as the plural of the Latin-derived noun datum.
A datum was a single piece of information,
and data worked as a word for all of those pieces taken collectively.
The massed nature of data gave it a life of its own as a singular noun.
Now when we encounter data in English,
it occurs more commonly in the singular
(“the polling data was released this morning”).
The singular datum and the plural use of data still occur,
but are rarer than singular data.
Another example to which criteria is often compared is agenda,
which came to English as a plural for the noun agendum.
Agenda referred to the list of things needing to be done,
and a single item on that was an agendum.
Unlike data and agenda, however,
criteria still shows use as a count noun (“here are three criteria”)
alongside the emerging singular.
Only time will tell if criteria will continue to show
preference as the singular form over criterion.
Merriam-Webster Dictionary:
Words at Play
criterium
Definition:
a bicycle race of a specified number of laps on a closed course over public roads closed to normal traffic.
If criterium seems like a funny way to spell criterion,
that’s because, in a way, it is—both words share the same root.
In racing, criterium means
“a bicycle race of a specified number of laps on a closed course over public roads closed to normal traffic.”
Often this is a loop around a town square or some other central location.
This allows fans to see riders pass on every lap—not possible with road races.
A commentary is often broadcast over loudspeakers, often including announcements for special prizes during the race for winners of an individual lap, known as primes (pronounced PREEMS), from the French word for “bonus.”
Criterion means
“a standard on which a judgment or decision may be based,”
and entered English in the 1600s from Greek.
Criterium comes from French: critérium is a word
meaning “competition” or
“sporting event that classifies or eliminates competitors.”
It was first used in English in 1970.
Collins COBUILD English Usage
criterion
A criterion is a standard by which you judge or evaluate something.
The most important criterion for entry is that applicants must design their own work.
The plural of criterion is criteria.
The Commission did not apply the same criteria to advertising.
