Grammar Clinic: The REAL difference between MORAL and MORALE

MORAL (noun / adjective)

As a noun, a moral is the lesson learned from a story – often used in the expression “the moral of the story.”

The plural form, morals, has a different meaning. It refers to a person’s standards of determining right and wrong behaviour:

• The doctor refused to perform an abortion because it was against her morals.
• He has no morals whatsoever – he’ll do anything and everything to get good grades.

The adjective moral refers to things related to ethics (matters of right/wrong):

• If you know that a child is being abused, you have a moral obligation to inform the police.
• It is often used with moral obligation/responsibility/duty

MORALE (noun)

The noun morale is completely different!

First of all, there is a pronunciation difference:

• moral: MOR – al
• morale: mor – ALE

Morale means the state of spirit/emotions of a group of people – their general confidence and cheerfulness.

• If a sport team has high morale, it means members of the team are feeling good and optimistic.
• If morale is low among students of a school, it means the students are feeling negative and not motivated.