conuly

I was curious enough to try to investigate a bit. Looking around the internet didn't tell me much useful (aside from one poll which found that more people used 'splinter' than 'sliver' - no geographical information, though.)

So I asked around on facebook, and a contact who saw what I was doing also asked around, and here's my impression of the results.

My question was: "what do you call a bit of wood that gets stuck in you? A sliver? A splinter? Something else?"

Most Americans who responded said "splinter", though there were a few attestations of 'sliver' (one from Twin Cities, MN, and one from South Dakota); a few more Americans were familiar with 'sliver' but would say 'splinter'. (I had American responses from a variety of parts of the country, but especially Ohio and Texas.)

Most of the Canadians who responded said "sliver", though I had two said "splinter" (including one who grew up largely overseas).

The data's not tidy enough to tell exactly what usage is where, but there does seem to be a tendency for people from most parts of the US to say 'splinter' and people from Canada to say 'sliver'.

A few people volunteered distinctions between 'sliver' and 'splinter'; for some, 'splinter' was bigger than 'sliver' (one American said it's a splinter if you can pull it out, a sliver if it's too small to see; one Canadian said 'sliver' for the default of what gets stuck in you, and a splinter is bigger.) A number of Americans said it's a splinter if it's wood, a sliver if it's glass (or some other material). And some people said 'sliver' refers to shape, without being stuck in someone necessarily, while a splinter is what gets stuck in someone.