Difficulty: Easy
Correct Answer: adoption
Explanation:
Introduction / Context:
This question assesses your ability to recognise correct English spelling among a set of similar looking words. In competitive examinations, questions of this type are used to check whether a candidate has a reasonably wide reading habit and familiarity with common word forms. Out of the four given alternatives, only one is a standard correctly spelled word that you would find in reliable dictionaries, while the remaining options include extra letters, wrong vowel combinations, or doubled consonants that do not match standard usage. Your task is to identify the correctly spelled word.
Given Data / Assumptions:
Concept / Approach:
The skill tested here is recognition of standard spelling. The word adoption is a well known noun meaning the act of adopting, as in adopting a child or adopting a policy. The other options resemble real English words but are incorrectly formed. crocusses appears to be a faulty plural of crocus, which should be written as crocuses. dollorous looks like a distorted version of dolorous, meaning full of sorrow, and pallatine resembles palatine, which is related to the palate or to certain historical offices, but the double l creates a wrong spelling. By comparing each option with known words, you can quickly see which one is correct.
Step-by-Step Solution:
Step 1: Look at adoption. This is a common word used in everyday language and in legal contexts. Its spelling a d o p t i o n matches the root adopt plus the suffix ion, which is a normal and standard formation.
Step 2: Consider crocusses. The flower crocus forms its plural as crocuses or sometimes croci in specialised contexts, but crocusses with double s is not a recognised standard plural.
Step 3: Examine dollorous. The correct spelling of the adjective that means sorrowful is dolorous, without a double l and with a single o before rous. Therefore dollorous is incorrect.
Step 4: Check pallatine. This is close to palatine. In standard dictionaries palatine appears in historical and anatomical contexts, while pallatine with double l is not standard.
Step 5: Since only adoption matches a well known correct spelling, it must be the correct answer.
Verification / Alternative check:
If you consult a good English dictionary or recall common word patterns, adoption will clearly appear as a valid word. The other three options either do not appear at all or are flagged as misspellings. For example, crocusses is not listed as an accepted plural form of crocus, whereas crocuses is. Similarly, dolorous appears but dollorous does not, and palatine appears but pallatine does not. This confirms that adoption is the only correctly spelled option.
Why Other Options Are Wrong:
crocusses is incorrect because the standard plural of crocus is crocuses, not crocusses.
dollorous is incorrect because the correct adjective is spelled dolorous, with a single l and a specific vowel pattern.
pallatine is incorrect because the established term is palatine, without double l in the middle.
Common Pitfalls:
A frequent mistake in such questions is to trust how a word looks phonetically rather than recalling or checking its standard form. Learners often assume that adding extra consonants like double l or double s makes a word look more serious or classical, but this often leads to errors. Another pitfall is confusing similar sounding words or remembering them only vaguely from reading. To avoid this, it is helpful to build a habit of noticing spellings carefully when you encounter new vocabulary in books, articles, or exam material.
Final Answer:
The only correctly spelled standard English word among the options is adoption.
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