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Aspect and Variant Inflection in English Verbs

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 April 2026

Randolph Quirk
Randolph Quirk*
Affiliation:
University College London
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Abstract

A small set of English verbs may take the inflections -ed or -t for preterit and past participle. The hypothesis that forms in divided usage are not randomly distributed was tested on groups of British and American subjects by presenting these forms in ‘forced-choice’ selection tests. Despite the well-known difference between American and British usage in preferring one or the other of the inflections, the -t forms were predominantly selected in participial use and for preterits in contexts suggestive of non-durative (‘effective’) aspect.

Information

Type
Research Article
Information
Language , Volume 46 , Issue 2 , June 1970, pp. 300 - 311
Copyright
Copyright © 1970 by Linguistic Society of America

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