Exploring Collocational Patterns and Genres: An Analysis of the Use of Poisonous and Venomous in American English

Abstract

This research study explores the usage differences between the synonymous adjectives poisonous and venomous. Based on the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA), comprising over one billion words, representing American English from 1990 to 2023 across eight genres, i.e., spoken language, fiction, magazines, newspapers, academic texts, webpages, weblogs, and TV/movie subtitles, this study investigates the distribution of both synonyms across genres and their collocational patterns. This study addresses: 1) the distribution of poisonous and venomous across genres, and 2) common noun collocates of these synonyms. The findings reveal both adjectives are prevalent in informal contexts, such as fiction and magazines. However, distinct collocational preferences emerge in that poisonous aligns with nouns related to gases, chemicals, substances, and food, while venomous is usually combined with nouns denoting actions, emotions, and food items. This study highlights the interplay among lexical choice, formality, and collocational preferences in English.