It bothers me a lot when I see the word “data” used in a grammatically correct way. Technically “data” is a plural word, referring to many numbers all together. While “this data shows that monkeys are actually smarter than 43% of people on the internet” sounds fine, the correct way would be to say “these data show that monkeys are smarter than 43% of people on the internet.”
I have to pronounce this grammar anomaly in a British accent, or else I sound like an idiot. In the UK, people often refer to large groups of people in a plural sense. In America we say “The government is announcing a new program,” but in the UK they say “The government are announcing a new program.”
I am strongly against using the word data in this more “correct” way, since it isn’t representative of how people talk. But it does feel good to correct people, especially the types of people that like to present data.
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