Many have said that sorry is the hardest word but theyd be wrong， linguistically speaking at least.

A poll found 10 words that Britons consistently find the most challenging to pronounce. The word they find hardest to pronounce is “phenomenon”. Next in the top 10 of tongue-twisters are “remuneration”， and “statistics”.

Speakers also have a problem getting their tongue around “ethnicity”， “hereditary” and “particularly”， according to the body charged with recording public utterances. Completing the list are “conjugal”， “specific”， “processes” and “development”.

Leah Willersdorf， of the BIVR， said， “We work with many different types of professionals and hear all kinds of voices during our work. However， when it comes to the English language it always seems to be the same few words that verbally trip people up， with the speaker having to repeat the word in order to get it right， or just abandoning their attempts and moving on.”

BIVR members were quizzed by the team behind the popular word game Scrabble. According to the words buffs， one in 10 players admits to being reluctant to producing words that they cannot pronounce.

University of York sociolinguistics expert Professor Paul Kerswill said the English language has evolved to compensate for tricky pronunciations but some words remain a challenge.

He said， “People always find a way of simplifying words that they find difficult to get their tongues round， so that an everyday word like ‘handbag sounds like ‘hambag. Our forebears simplified ‘waistcoat to ‘weskit—but weve turned our backs on that. And most people talk about ‘Febry and Wensday！”

很多人認為“對不起”是最難說出口的詞，不過這樣的說法不正確——至少從語言學的角度上說。

一項投票使英國人覺得最難發(fā)音的10個單詞浮出水面。最難發(fā)音的單詞是“phenomenon（現(xiàn)象）”。在十大最拗口的單詞中緊隨其后的是“remuneration（報酬）”和“statistics（統(tǒng)計數(shù)字）”。

根據(jù)人們在公共場合的發(fā)音記錄，會使說話者發(fā)音困難，舌頭打結(jié)的單詞有：“ethnicity（民族）”“hereditary（遺傳性）”“particularly（特別地）”。列表余下的單詞還有“conjugal（婚姻的）”“specific（特殊的）”“process（過程）”和“development（發(fā)展）”。

英國速記人員協(xié)會成員莉亞·溫勒斯多表示：“我們和許多不同類型的專業(yè)人士合作，在工作中聽過各種發(fā)音。然而，在英語口語中，人們總是在某幾個特定單詞后犯錯。說話者要重復該單詞以糾正發(fā)音，又或者索性跳過這個單詞，繼續(xù)下面的話。”

英國速記人員協(xié)會的成員們通過拼字游戲完成了這個小測試。根據(jù)拼字游戲的結(jié)果，有十分之一的玩家承認，要拼出他們不會發(fā)音的單詞有些困難。

約克大學社會語言學專家保羅·凱斯維爾表示，隨著英語的演化，一些拗口的單詞已經(jīng)逐漸進化發(fā)展，但是一些很難發(fā)音的單詞依然存在。

他說：“人們總是能夠找到方法簡化那些難以順利發(fā)音的單詞，這樣，‘handbag（手袋）這種日常單詞會聽起來像‘hambag。我們的祖先把單詞‘waistcoat（背心）簡化成了‘weskit——不過后來我們又放棄了這一種說法。還有一些人把‘二月讀成‘Febry，把‘星期三讀成‘Wensday?！?/p>