When foreigners see the group of words “腐败、腐化、腐烂、腐蚀、腐朽” when they study Chinese words, they may be probably confused. As a matter of fact, it is not so difficult because all of them mean something getting worse but with different objects and using situations.

“腐败” is an adjective means corruption. It usually indicates people’s thought and action as well as the disorder of the system, organization, institution and measure and so on. We can say “腐败行为” and “政治腐败”. Students who learn Mandarin in China should know that “腐化” is a verb to describe the rot of organism, implying the thought goes bad.

“腐烂” is also a verb means the organism is resolved by the microbe. It has a limited using extent. We often say “尸体腐烂了”. With the same part of speech, “腐蚀” means certain objects are deteriorated because of chemical action. But students who study in China should realize it is also can be used to describe the thought go bad under negative influence like “腐蚀人的思想”.

When you study in Chinese school in China, teachers may tell you that “腐朽” is an adjective mostly indicates the materials contain fiber like wood are rotted because of the wind and rain or the microbe. Accordingly, we can say “腐朽的木材”. We can also apply it to describe the corruption of thoughts and systems like “腐朽的制度”.

Another group of words that the students should know when they learn Mandarin are “覆盖” and “掩盖”. When we use “覆盖”, we mean to cover soothing from the top to the bottom to separate it from the outside. Mostly speaking, the objects are the specific objects. The example is “大雪覆盖了路面”.

However, the foreign learners who come to learn Chinese in China should know that “掩盖” indicates to hide so that it can’t be seen. The object can be the concrete things. But we also can use it to modify the abstract thing like the insufficiency, mistake or shortcoming. We can say “掩盖真相” and “掩盖错误”.

The words explained above are frequently used in our daily life. Therefore, Chinese language learners should know clearly about the application and put them into use properly.