어렵다고

In a sentence

• 그 문제는 학생들이 풀기에 정말 어렵다고 생각합니다.

  I think that problem is truly difficult for students to solve.

  The word '어렵다고' is used as a quoted descriptive phrase, indicating the difficulty of the problem.

• 어렵다고 하지 않았는데 왜 이렇게 힘들어 보이는 거죠?

  You didn't say it was difficult, so why does it look so exhausting?

  Here, '어렵다고' refers to a quoted statement, questioning the discrepancy between what was said and what appears.

• 그 상황을 친구들에게 어렵다고 설명했어요.

  I explained to my friends that the situation was difficult.

  In this sentence, '어렵다고' is used to describe the act of explaining to others about the perceived difficulty.