Punctuation Questions Medium
A hyphen should be used in compound adjectives when they come before a noun and work together to modify it. This is done to avoid confusion or ambiguity in the meaning of the phrase. For example, in the phrase "well-known author," the hyphen is used to clarify that the author is both well and known, rather than being well and known separately. Similarly, in "five-year-old child," the hyphens indicate that the child is both five and years old. Overall, the hyphen is used to connect the words in a compound adjective and ensure that their combined meaning is clear to the reader.