下面舉一些例子再來分析闡述一下區別：

我們用person來表示一個“單數”的人，尤其是帶有“individual”這種感覺的時候。例子：

Joel is such a nice person.

She’s a person I have a lot of respect for.

表示不只一個人或者一般個體，不特指某一個人，在這種意思上有時和persons是一樣的，但是persons只用在特別的領域，這個後面說，先看people的例子：

I saw three people standing on the corner.

(Not: I saw three persons…)

Jim and Wendy are such nice people.

The plane crash killed 370 people.

Hundreds of people are reported to have been killed since government troops began pounding known strongholds of opposition groups.

Persons也是person的複數，但是，更趨向於用在非常正式的場合。比如法律條款和警告標識中，以及一些習慣用語中（persons of interest, displaced persons, missing persons）例子：

Any person or persons found in possession of illegal substances will be prosecuted.

Between 1980 and 2002, 16,556 refugees and displaced persons were resettled in New Zealand under the Refugee Quota Programme.

總結一下，如果表示單數個體，請用person。複數的情況，多數用people是更適合的，除非你在寫文章時為了表現個人喜好，在很正式的情況如法律條款中應該用persons。但是當表示某種群體比如the Frence people的時候，要用people。

個人見解，還望指正。

person的常用複數形式是people,只是在文書或通告等正式用語中採用persons的形式person是單數名詞,正式文體中用him或her與其照應,非正式文體中可用they與其照應