Kibbitzer 21

Reason to v. Reason for

This Kibbitzer is based on the following point from an end-of- term paper by a Japanese-student of EFL:

OriginalRevision
When I asked her reason to attend classes, she said ... When I asked her reason for attending classes, she said ....

The importance of the word reason in academic discourse suggested that it might be worth looking at these structures more closely. A rapid concordance of reason in the immediate left context of for + V+ing and to + V ahowed that there was a strong tendency for the former structure to appear where the reason is named as specific (typical determiners being Possessives, the and one), while the latter structure tended to appear where the reason is named as non-specific (typical determiners being every, any and no, together with the Zero determiner):

   1 ing to use Mr Yeltsin's poor health as a reason for overthrowing him. The president spen
   2  us.`That, he said heavily, `is the best reason for getting the Prince of Wales married 
   3 er action against EU fraud is not a good reason for holding up legislation which must ge
   4 matic venture, he reminded them that his reason for being there was not to act as a role
   5 de this year. But that slide is the main reason for fearing higher inflation just when t
   6 it was rumoured yesterday that the MoD/s reason for blocking the book was its concern th
   7 es.  "But the Citizens' is different. My reason for working is to try and enjoy myself. 
   8 mperfect comprehension. This is just one reason for welcoming the increasing availabilit
   9  Gregor Mendel. But that is not the real reason for cutting such people out of your life
  10 eeing another soul. This was part of the reason for moving her manufacturing base away f

  11  harmonising dialogue. We all have ample reason to be grateful to Spender for his 85 yea
  12 ue of agents provocateurs. If we had any reason to suspect that an informant was acting 
  13 for three days to read it. We have every reason to be grateful to Andrew Davies for serv
  14 am Hussein. He is now a democrat and has reason to regret it. >The other is Ali Salim al
  15 o suburbia, there has been less and less reason to use the middle of many cities. >The h
  16 ts so many times now that we have little reason to believe that this will stop the firin
  17  little as possible "because there is no reason to believe that they do it better than b
  18 el when he was taken ill, but we have no reason to suppose it was inadequate.' The reali
  19 . Let us try the second option. Is there reason to believe our intuitions are not genuin
  20 egun on the tunnel and there was no real reason to doubt the project's viability - but s
After the consultation a more detailed investigation of 400 citations for the two structures confirmed the initial overall judgment, but but gave a more detailed picture:

Determinerfor +V
+ing		to+V
Possessives
  my reason
  their reason
  his reason
  's reason
  her reason
  its reason
  your reason
  whose reason		 33
7
6
5
5
4
3
2
1		 -
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
the
  the reason
  the only reason
  the main reason
  the best reason
  the real reason
  the major reason
  the other reason
  the principal reason
  the sole reason
  the (other adj) reason		 109
36
18
16
7
6
3
3
3
3
14		 5
5
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
one 15 1
a
  a reason
  another reason
  a good reason
  a/an (other adj) reason		 108
44
17
11
36		 26
16
3
1
6
Determinerfor +V
+ing		to+V
every
  have every reason
  there be every reason
  give X every reason
  (Other)		2
2
-
-
-		 41
27
10
3
1
Zero determiner
  have reason
  be reason
  have good reason
  be good reason
  have/be (other adj) reason
  (Other)		 18
1
1
9
3
2
2		 96
36
7
32
3
9
9
no
  be no reason
  have no reason
  see no reason
  give no reason
  no good reason		 18
12
-
2
3
1		 109
73
35
31
1
4
any
  have any reason
  see any reason
  give any reason
  be any reason		 4
-
1
2
1		 16
7
4
2
2

Evidently there is more to be discovered in these data by the determined linguistic researcher: for example the effect on specificity of the presence of an adjective. Also, further data are needed for these two structures in the context of the plural noun reasons.

Checks of a number of standard works of reference have failed to identify previous discussion of the point in this Kibbitzer: if you happen know of any such discussion, I'd be grateful if you could e-mail me with a reference.

4th May 1997 Consultant: Tim Johns
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