Rock the Vocab: From Apocalyptic to Utterly, Dictionary.com Uncovers Presidential Candidates' Favorite Words

OAKLAND, Calif., Feb. 29, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- As front-runners for the Democratic and Republican nominations will further emerge based on Super Tuesday results, Dictionary.com, the online and mobile resource dedicated to helping users master the art of language, today unveiled Your Candidate in a Word, a compelling look at the language favored by the current top presidential hopefuls. Based on analysis of the major presidential debates, one word has risen to the top for each nominee: systemic (Hillary Clinton), utterly (Ted Cruz), blue-collar (John Kasich), apocalyptic (Marco Rubio), handful (Bernie Sanders), and eminent (Donald Trump).

Through proprietary big data analysis from 15 main presidential debates, which took place between August 6, 2015 and February 13, 2016, Dictionary.com analyzed the language used by each candidate to identify the 20 words that were most statistically significant in each contender's speech.

While a number of the candidates' word representations relate to major issues and campaign platforms, such as Clinton on LGBT matters and Rubio on Guantanamo, just as many are adjectives that paint a clear picture of each candidate's speaking style and vocabulary, including Sander's frequent use of "perpetual" and Trump's favor of the word "nasty."

"Every idea and belief, down to the level of the individual words chosen, counts when it comes to candidates speaking to Americans on their plans for the country if they were to be elected," said Liz McMillan, CEO, Dictionary.com. "These words shed light on the issues, policies, and rhetoric of individual candidates on an extremely granular level, ultimately giving us valuable insight on the people vying to be the next President of the United States."

Below are the top 20 words or phrases favored by each candidate in Dictionary.com's analysis:

Hillary Clinton

1. systemic
2. children
3. seller
4. Libyans
5. Europeans
6. recommend
7. out-of-pocket
8. elsewhere
9. LGBT
10. AIG
11. contentious
12. advise
13. constant
14. compact
15. discrimination
16. arena
17. council
18. brothers
19. racism
20. U.N.

Ted Cruz

1. utterly
2. cronyism
3. ration
4. Rubio-Schumer
5. objective
6. Jihad
7. sessions
8. distract
9. suspend
10. patrol
11. Persian
12. whatsoever
13. clarity
14. catastrophic
15. flat
16. booming
17. Ayatollah
18. IRS
19. note
20. abandon

John Kasich

1. blue-collar
2. surplus
3. formula
4. incumbent
5. architect
6. balanced
7. budget
8. miner
9. discipline
10. Pentagon
11. Ohio
12. Saudis
13. hole
14. incentive
15. encryption
16. unify
17. foot
18. civilization
19. slap
20. ill

Marco Rubio

1. apocalyptic
2. agent
3. Guantanamo
4. sophisticated
5. modernize
6. vat
7. grandfather
8. Moammar
9. paycheck
10. killer
11. dozen
12. enterprise
13. capture
14. century
15. bless
16. expensive
17. Shia
18. reasonable
19. prove
20. teach

Bernie Sanders

1. handful
2. crumble
3. speculation
4. tuition-free
5. substantially
6. cease-fire
7. one-tenth
8. U.K.
9. Cayman Islands
10. buck
11. turnout
12. quagmire
13. Henry Kissinger
14. Earth
15. sum
16. perpetual
17. greed
18. capita
19. fossil
20. unintended

Donald Trump

1. eminent
2. tremendous
3. sudden
4. scholar
5. inversion
6. Atlantic
7. businessman
8. nasty
9. beautiful
10. domain
11. catastrophe
12. currency
13. nice
14. excuse
15. unbelievable
16. incompetent
17. disgrace
18. Mexico City
19. Japan
20. hell

About Dictionary.com
Dictionary.com, an IAC (NASDAQ: IAC) company, is the world's leading, definitive online and mobile resource dedicated to helping people master the art of language. We provide tens of millions of global monthly users with reliable access to millions of definitions, synonyms, audio pronunciations, example sentences, translations, and spelling help through our services at Dictionary.com and Thesaurus.com. Our leading mobile applications for reference and education have been downloaded more than 100 million times.

SOURCE Dictionary.com