IELTS vocabulary academic caution

Dominic Cole’s IELTS Blog
www.dcielts.com
IELTS and academic caution vocabulary
The language of academic caution can be used in IELTS to improve the coherence
of your writing and speaking. Here are some basic variations:
number

frequency

probability

some

sometimes

may

most

usual/usually

might

many/much

normally

could

a lot of

generally/in general

likely/likelihood

several

on the whole

possible/possibly

a few/a little

tend

probable/probably
perhaps/maybe

Grammatical problems
Please note this common mistake made with some/many/few/most
some people

correct to talk about people in general

some of the people
some of people

correct to talk about a particular group of people
incorrect

Variations - word families

To use these words well, you need to be able to use the different forms of the
words. Here are just two examples
Possible
possible

It is possible that the city will

possibly

The city could possibly grow


Dominic Cole’s IELTS Blog
www.dcielts.com
possibility

Thereʼs a possibility that the city will grow

Probable
probable

It is probable that the city will grow

probably

The city will probably grow

probability

The probability is that the city will grow

Variations - qualifying adverbs
If you want to add further variation to your speaking/writing, consider using adverbs
of degree such as “fairly”, “quite” and “rather”; eg
It is fairly likely that
It is quite probable that
It is rather unlikely that

Variations - some idiomatic expressions for general ideas
Here are some more idiomatic expressions to express general ideas. As ever,
choose the expressions that mean something to you and practise using them in
context. You do not need all these phrases. If you are uncertain about their
meaning consult Macmillan Online Dictionary
a fair amount of

thereʼs a fair amount of unemployment

a good deal

Young people tend to watch TV a good deal

by and large

By and large, people in my country enjoy watching
cricket

as a rule

As a rule, men tend to do less housework than women

nine times out of ten

Nine times out of ten Iʼd read a book before ....

more often than not

More often than not I ask my wife before....