许多写作者犯的一个常见的错误是不尽可能的用最清晰的方式组织句子成分,特别是在句子包含修饰语的时候。英文写作中的修饰成分是描述句子中其他特定成分的单词,从句或短语。
举例说明如下
示例 1:
- The patient experienced severe pain in his right arm when lifting objects for three months.
根据原文的英文写作方式,这个句子结构在一定程度上,暗示这个病人在举起物体达三个月(持续地)并且在这样做的时候体验到疼痛而不是持续疼痛三个月。一个更准确的表达方式可以是这样的:
- For three months, the patient experienced severe pain in his right arm upon lifting an object.
示例 2:
- Appropriate statistical tests were used to examine the correlations between variables, including Student's t-tests, Spearman's rank correlations, and Pearson's correlations.
在当前这个句子写作的方式,列在句子末尾的测试等同于变量,是不对的。以下是此句子更好的表达方式:
- Appropriate statistical tests, including Student's t-tests, Spearman's rank correlations, and Pearson's correlations, were used to examine the correlations between variables.
有时候改述修饰成分而不是完全的去掉修饰成分,可以更好地澄清它在句子里的功能。
示例 3:
- Growing evidence suggests that plasma ACE activity, the key enzyme of the RAS, may be higher in adults with several cardiovascular disorders.
修饰语“the key enzyme of RAS”实际上修饰“ACE”而不是“activity”,因此这个句子可以重新排列成以下结构:
- Growing evidence suggests that the plasma activity of ACE, the key enzyme of the RAS, may be higher in adults with several cardiovascular disorders.
综上的三个示例我们看到,错误的置放修饰成分会让阅读句子的人产生误解而影响了句子的愿意。我们希望以上的调整句子结构的示例可以帮助到您了解如何避免错误的使用修饰成分。