Conscience is a noun, your sense of right and wrong: a guilty conscience, a clear conscience. Conscious is an adjective: aware (conscious of the risk), awake (the patient is conscious) or deliberate (a conscious decision). The third lookalike is conscientious: careful and hardworking.
conscience or conscious — can you pick the right one?
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a clear/guilty conscience; be conscious of something; a conscious decision
- His conscience made him return the extra change.
- She was conscious of the noise but kept reading.
- Choosing a smaller venue was a conscious decision to limit costs.
What changed
First versionI am conscience of the pressure on the team.
RevisionI am conscious of the pressure on the team.
The words differ by one syllable, so conscience can seem fine for I'm aware. But after am you need an adjective, and conscience is a noun. Conscious was used instead: I am conscious of the pressure means I realise how much pressure there is.
A conscious decision is a deliberate one, not necessarily an honest one. Consciousness is the state of being awake: lose consciousness. Conscientious means careful and hardworking: a conscientious student.
Your turn
Her ___ bothered her because she had blamed someone else for her mistake.
Show the answer
conscience — What can bother a person is their conscience, a noun: her conscience bothered her. Conscious is an adjective and can't be the subject.
Describe something a person did that left them with a guilty or a clear conscience. Use conscience.
His conscience would not let him keep the wallet, so he handed it to the station staff.
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