# It's and Its: a poll

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-and-its-a-poll/763852>\
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion\
**Created:** [August 24, 2016, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-and-its-a-poll/763852 "2016-08-24T21:38:30Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 25

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**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\
**Post date:** [August 25, 2016, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-and-its-a-poll/763852/25 "2016-08-25T14:44:21Z")

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> [@dracoi](#):
>
> At least its/it’s has a good chance of being a typo. Mistaking _they’re_ for _their_ is a crime that requires intent.

I’d think almost everyone knows “they’re” is a contraction of “they are” and would select the correct word if they thought about it. When a person types _their_ instead of _they’re_ or _it’s_ instead of _its_, it’s often just an aberration caused by typing quickly. Conclusions drawn about the person’s intelligence from something like this are likely to be very wrong.

I know this from myself. It’s been 55 years since I won a spelling bee but I test myself with games and puzzles and am not yet demented. However I frequently type wrong words, often completely wrong words that are phonetically a little similar. Among many many examples, I once wrote “vowels” for “values” and “pretends” for “protects.” I see evidence that some other Dopers make similar errors.

I don’t think it affects my speech much; I’m not sure about handwriting since almost all my writing is via keyboard. I didn’t have the problem when I was younger; it started in my 60’s. I find the way to avoid this and other typos is to stare at the keyboard while I’m typing, monitoring where the fingers actually go!

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