One more morphological difference is the use in American English –ward: e.g. without -s > toward, backward.
Preferences in AmE are sure(ly), why then, okay now, anyways, still, all.
In standard American the adverb “right” is currently limited to contexts involving location or time:
e.g. He is right around the corner.
However, in the Southern-based vernaculars “right” may be used to intensify the degree of the other types of attributes: e.g. She is right nice.
1.9. BRITISH ENGLISH AND AMERICAN ENGLISH:
DIFFERENCES IN LEXIS
The lexical relations between British English and American English have been analyzed in many different ways.
The development approach. The development approach takes the criteria of use, intelligibility and regional status. It sets up four groups.
The first group comprises words that are neither understood nor used in other variety: Am. meld = merge, Br. hive off = separate from the main group.
The second group contains items understood but not used elsewhere: AmE – cookie, checkers, howdy, British English – draughts, scone, cheerio.
In the third group there are items both understood and used in either language but they still have a distinctively American English or British English flavor: figure out, movie (AmE), telly, car, park (BE).
The fourth group embraces lexical material that is completely intelligible and widely used in both varieties but had lost American English or British English flavour it once had: semi-detached (originally British), boost (originally American).
The casual approach. Scholars have also enquired into the less subjective and more linguistic reasons why items are or are not borrowed from the one variety into the other. In this causal approach, the vivid and expressive nature of a number of words and phrases is held to have helped them expand, for example, many of the informal or slang items from AmE such as fiend (as in dope fiend or fitness fiend), joint ('cheap or dirty place of meeting for drinking, eating etc.') and sucker ('gullible person'). Secondly, many borrowings are short and snappy and often reinforce the trend in common Standard English towards the monosyllabic word, such as AmE contact (beside get in touch with), cut (next to reduction) and fix (in addition to prepare, repair) or BrE chips (beside AmE french fries) and dicey (beside AmE chancy). The third reason has to do with the fact that some loans provide a term for an idea or concept where there was none before. Borrowings of this latter sort are particularly valuable because they fill a conceptual gap. Examples are originally AmE boost, debunk, know-how and high/low brow or originally BrE brunch, smog, cop, tabloid or gadget.
The semantic approach. It compares words and phrases with their referents in terms of sameness and differences.
1st group: most words and their meanings are the same (no difficulty in understanding)