penchant

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for March 31, 2025 is: penchant PEN-chunt noun Penchant refers to a strong liking for something, or a strong tendency to behave in a certain way. It is usually used with for. // My penchant for mathematics helped me become an engineer. [See the entry >](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/penchant) Examples: "Sly Lives! is exceptionally strong in its attention to musical detail—even more than [Questlove](https://www.britannica.com/topic/Questlove-American-musician-and-producer)'s previous cinematic effort, the Academy Award–winning Summer of Soul, Sly Lives! feels like a film made by a great musician. The film's interviewees offer illuminating ruminations on Sly's vocal arrangements, including his penchant for switching back and forth between unison vocal parts and harmonized ones ..." — Jack Hamilton, Slate, 13 Feb. 2025 Did you know? English has multiple p-words that imply a strong instinct or liking for something, including [propensity](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/propensity) and [proclivity](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/proclivity), but to keep things precise, penchant is the proper word for implying a pronounced, persistent taste in a person ("a penchant for pretty pendants") or a predominant [predilection](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/predilection) for performing particular actions ("a penchant for petting penguins"). Penchant traces back all the way to the Latin verb pendere, meaning "to weigh," but is more immediately preceded in English by the French word penchant, from the present participle of pencher, meaning "to incline."