Mischievous, Mischievious

Is There Some Mischief in Being Mischievious?

I like Wuggle Pets! They’re cute. I think I’ll order the mischievious monkey. What’s that? You say that there is no such word as mischievious.

Well, listen to this commercial. This word is used here at 0:47, so it must be right. [English Essay Writing Tips derives no income from this commercial. There is also no guarantee that it will still be available for you to hear.]
The truth is that there is mischief here. Regrettably, it is not as much in the cute monkey as it is in the wrong pronunciation of the word mischievous.

The wrong pronunciation, which is becoming quite common, has an extra syllable that leads to the incorrect spelling of the word. 

The following table compares the correct and incorrect pronunciations and spellings:

Mischievous versus Mischievious
	Incorrect	Correct
Pronunciation	mis – chee’ – vee – uhs Note: - The emphasis is on the second syllable. - The third syllable is an intrusion.	mis’ – chi – vis Note: - The emphasis is on the first syllable. - The i’s in the second and third syllables are half-vowel sounds.
Spelling	mischievious or mischevious	mischievous

Click here to hear the correct pronunciation of mischievous.
The first loudspeaker icon on that web page will give you the British pronunciation; the second icon will give you the American pronunciation. Neither way incorporates the intrusive syllable.

More mischief
One website lists the “real word” as “mischievious” and the “common misspelling as “mischievous.” They go on to state that they are “pretty sure” the word mischievous is misspelled, and then they list links for further research. 

Although the links themselves evince the correctness of mischievous, they have embraced the error. [It would have been good to point this out directly to them, but their contact information is missing.]
 
Mischievous has no legitimate place in the English language, and its use cannot be justified. It is possible that it has arisen by confusion with the sound of words that do have the –vious ending, such as envious, previous, and devious. 

Don’t be devious. Don’t indulge in the mischief of giving this word a third eye i. It has only two i’s like my mischievous monkey.
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Your comments, observations, and questions are welcome. Are you aware of other words whose pronunciation is questionable? Ask here for clarification.

If you ever find a dead link in this article, please comment here to alert me to this. Your help is appreciated.
Here are more articles to help you with English words, grammar, and essay writing.

This item was written to help you in your use of the English language. The writer, Owen Fourie, is the owner of Flawhound, an online tutoring service guiding you to improve your writing skills.

The 8 Habits of Successful GCs Includes Being 'Mischievous'

The most successful general counsel show low “excitability” but are highly “mischievous,” according to a new report that highlights the eight habits of highly effective legal executives.

Just what does being “mischievous” mean? It means going “well beyond spotting legal issues to helping the business actually take risks and find creative solutions,” according to the report by executive-search firm Russell Reynolds Associates. In fact, the”best” legal executives are 11% more willing to take risks than less-effective legal execs, the report found.

In addition to mischief and low excitability, the rest of the eight habits of successful GCs are:

• Decisiveness,
• Social Boldness,
• Striving for Achievement,
• Social Confidence,
• Competitiveness, and
• Persuasiveness.

"Taken together, our findings suggest that legal executives should strive to become what we call the 'calm risk taker," the report states.

To that end, RRA suggests "decreasing excitability and increasing mischievousness" through various on-the-job experiences. For example, volunteering for a leadership role in crisis management, or with a team that's leanly staffed or geographically isolated, can work to decrease a legal executive's excitability.

Other activities such as participating in a new-product development exercise or leading a strategic-planning session (without focusing on the legal implications) can help make a legal executive more "mischievous," the report states.

The report also found that general counsels' successful habits aren't all that different from those found in the non-legal world. RRA's report is based on an analysis of 3,000 assessment tests that measured legal executives' skills in decision-making, communication, and relationships.