Questioned vs asked

The examiner questioned who the first man to fly in space was.

or

The examiner asked who the first man to fly in space was.

Are both correct? Does using one instead of another affect its meaning in any way?

Solution 1:

Are both correct?

More context would be helpful, but technically both are correct.

Questioned and asked are both past tense verbs, so switching them does not affect the sentence grammatically.

Does using one instead of another affect its meaning in any way?

Sort of. I would prefer asked. Asked is the actual action of asking something but questioned could mean two things. It could mean something similar to asked or questioning something already said or done.

Cambridge Dictionary supports that questioned has two meanings. One meaning is:

to express doubts about the value or truth of something

so, without a larger context, the reader may interpret questioned as "to express doubts" rather than to "ask a question".