扮演 vs 发挥

[Scoobyqueen]

I have heard different opinions on the use of 扮演 in the phrase

[Sarevok]

I've never actually seen 扮演作用 as a collocation before (but it seems to be possible), so I immediately thought of the second one as a better option...

Some Google statistics:

"发挥着举足轻重的作用"

1,450,000 hits

"扮演着举足轻重的作用"

221,000 hits

[Scoobyqueen]

Thanks Sarevok.

Sometimes though (in English) the less frequent the more eloquent and high brow :-)

[DecafLat]

I think you can use either and people will understand what you mean; but 扮演着...作用 would be considered a miscollocation in more pedantic circles, because 扮演 literally means "to play (a role)" and is supposed to coupled with 角色 (role).

Therefore, to say 扮演着举足轻重的作用 would be tantamount to saying "to play a key effect on...".

[Kenny同志]

扮演着举足轻重的作用.

I am afraid this is tranlsationese of the English phrase “play a key role in something”. It sounds very awkward to me.

发挥作用 is a common collocation.

A variant of the expression“发挥着举足轻重的作用” is “xx的作用（其）作用举足轻重”.