Should I use "previous experience in" or "previous experience of"?

Question

I've been looking everywhere to see what's the right approach, and I can't find anything in english.stackexchange.com or other sites.

I have the following sentence:

Our customers love this feature, but we know it's not always that easy if you don't have previous experience of creating rating scales.

I'm wondering if the above is correct, or if this is correct instead:

Our customers love this feature, but we know it's not always that easy if you don't have previous experience in creating rating scales.

Notice the difference in the use of “of” vs. “in”.  Which one is the correct one in this sentence?

Answer 1

While you will not be misunderstood using either case, and I'm certain you will find plenty of examples of both in current language use. I'd suggest this distinction will always remain clear:

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Use in when talking about experience meaning a skill level.

I have 10 years experience in Java, as a software engineer.

This tool should only be used by those with experience in astrozoology.

In these cases you are talking about experience as a quantity, and showing that you want to have a quantity of experience within a certain field/subject. You can also change "in" to "with" for the same meaning.

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Use of when talking about an experience as an event.

I was underwater for 10 minutes, I thoroughly do not recommend the experience of drowning.

Skydiving is great - the experience of falling at 100mph is glorious.

In these cases you are describing an experience as an event, where "experience" could be replaced with "phenomenon" or "feeling". As such, you are giving more detail on what the exact feeling was by saying "the experience of falling" etc. Here, experience is not quantifiable, it is referring to the general idea of the event.

Answer 2

I think both are grammatically correct and that if there is a right answer, it would be mainly context based. Use of "in" in this respect is slightly more informal and conversational and in my opinion sounds better. If this is directed at a wide audience I would use this.

Use of "of" doesn't flow as well in the sentence but in formal language might be a better choice.

Answer 3

My first instinct was that we use "experience in" in a professional/skill context and "experience of" for more personal/occasional things.

However, when I set out to double-check and verify:

• Do you have any previous experience of this type of work?
• He gained extensive experience in the field of artificial intelligence whilst working on the project.
• This new approach draws on years of experience of teaching children to read.
• a doctor with experience in dealing with patients suffering from stress
• He had first-hand experience of poverty.
• the collective experience of everyday life
• Share your experiences of parenthood by emailing the address below.
• It was her first experience of living alone.

I think what the examples above demonstrate is that we can use both "experience of" and "experience of" in a professional/skill context (examples 1-4 above) but only "experience of" in a personal experience context (examples 5-8 above).