一、名词
考点分析
名词的误用主要包括:
(一)可数名词单复数形式混淆
单复数互改是博士研究生入学考试中英语改错题的基本题型之一。在具体语境中可数名词复数被误用为单数,或可数名词单数被误用为复数形式。改动的依据有:一是名词前的修饰限定成分;二是上下文的逻辑关系。
可数名词的规则变化形式(见下表):

名词的不规则变化形式(见下表):

(续)

(二)可数名词与不可数名词的混淆
名词的“可数”与“不可数”是考博英语改错题的命题的热点之一,因此,考生在备考时应注意以下可数和不可数名词问题。
(1)不可数名词包括抽象名词、物质名词和专有名词,一般没有复数形式,不能直接被数词修饰。英语中除了如air,water,butter,milk,iron等这些容易识别的不可数名词外,还有一些很容易弄错,其中典型的有:
fun(乐趣),homework(家庭作业),advice(劝告,建议),behavior(行为),equipment(设备),housework(家务)等。
(2)物质名词一般不用复数形式,但有些物质名词的复数形式可以表示不同的类别,如:foods各种食品,fishes各种鱼,fruits各种水果。
(3)物质名词表示数量时,一般用表示数量的短语来表示,如:a cup of tea,four pieces of bread。但下列名词可以具体为有数量的相应物体,作单数、复数均可:some coffee(一些咖啡)/a coffee(一杯咖啡),drink(饮料)/two drinks(两杯饮料),ice(冰)/two ices(两份冰淇淋)等。
(4)有一些抽象名词有复数形式,但意义有所改变。
如:work(工作)→works(著作),glass(玻璃)→glasses(眼镜)
quarter(四分之一)→quarters(军营),force(力气)→forces(军队)。
(5)定冠词加上姓氏的复数形式,表示全家人或夫妇二人;姓氏的复数形式前加数词,则表示若干个同姓的人。如:the Zhangs张家,three Zhangs三个姓张的。
(三)单复数同形的名词的误用
只用作单数的复数形式的名词。如:physics,mathematics,news,the United States等。
例:Physics is taught by Mr.Wang in our school this semester.
句中physics指“物理学”,是单数名词,故其谓语动词应为第三人称单数。技巧点拨
要识别这类错误,考生应注意以下技巧:
(1)注意名词前表示数量概念的修饰语和名词后的谓语等线索,判断名词的单复数形式。
(2)一般来说,单数可数名词前必须有冠词,否则就应该是复数形式。
(3)熟悉常见的表示数量概念的短语,牢记其修饰的是可数名词还是不可数名词。常见的修饰可数名词的短语有a number of等。
(4)熟悉两种名词所有格(’s所有格和of所有格)的用法。一般来说,有生命的名词所有格既可用’s又可用of表示,无生命的名词所有格必须用of表示。词尾有s的复数名词所有格加’,词尾没s的复数名词所有格加’s;复合名词或名词短语的所有格在最后一个词后加’s。
(5)熟悉双重所有格的用法。当a(n),this,these,that,some,any,no等与名词所有格修饰同一名词时,两者不能同时放在该名词前面,要用双重所有格表示,即a(this,that...)+名词+of+名词所有格,如a daughter of Mrs.Brown’s。
典型真题
例1:
39.Television is one of the means
these feelings are created and conveyed
—and perhaps never before
so much to connect different 
in the recent events in Europe.(中国社会科学院2012年)
【名师点评】peoples→people。抽象名词复数误用。people变为复数peoples时,意义已发生改变,意为“人民”,此处的意思是“人(个体)”,应为单数形式。
例2:
39.The language has always changed,
the rate of change has been uneven;minor changes have slowly accumulated in every generation,but there have been
.The most important of these periods occurred during thetwo hundred and fifty years after 1066,
conquered England.(中国社会科学院2010年)
【名师点评】B。可数名词单复数误用。根据B项前面的have been可知,应该使用复数形式。应将period改为periods。故答案为B。
例3:
35.Although postmodernism incorporates
of Freudianism and themore credulous kind of cultural anthropology,it remains a fundamentally
,
maintaining
to marketeconomics and traditional social structures.(社会科学院2006年)
【名师点评】B。可数名词单复数误用。不定冠词a后加名词的单数形式。phenomena为复数形式,应改为phenomenon。
例4:
6.“For a statesman to try to maximize the GNP is about as sensible as for a composer of music to try to maximize the number of note in a symphony.”(对外经贸大学2005年)(https://www.daowen.com)
【名师点评】note→notes。可数名词单复数误用。the number of后应接复数名词。
18.There is
that children
learn foreignlanguages
than adults in similar
.(南京大学2008年)
【名师点评】D。situation作“情境”之意时,为不可数名词。classroom situation意为“教室情境”。
实战演练
1.They quickly brought down the age at marriage for both men and women and brought the birth rate to a twentieth century height after more than a hundred years of steady decline,producing the“baby boom”.____
2.Nowadays
no longer threw waste
or plastic bags everywhere
itlooked
3.There is no guarantee that plant breeders can continue to develop new,higher-yielding crop,but most researchers see their success to date as reason for hope____.
4.Moreover,toward the end of their seven-years,teacher-disciple relationship,Jung prophetically wrote to Freud,quoting from Nietzsche's Thus Spake Zarathustra,"One repays a teacher badly if one remains only a pupil."
5.According
researches,
the part of some contemporary
the issue of
to speak in drama has been handledskillfully.
6.
have a tang of exhilaration and
red as a smoke-greymist
the
of trees and houses.
7.In 1975,Gonzales began attending
,but he
with classes like
and 
8.Believe it or not,no one can afford to deny or
the tiny sparkle of an
,especially in an
of knowledge
.
9.The
found that even many a
who was aware of publishedguidelines continued to perform annual
,either patients wanted them,orbecause they believed the procedure gave them the chance to offer advice aboutpreventive health
.
10.As the society became more
,the
of children in the family and in thesociety become more obvious,each member must fulfill a number of personal andoccupational
and be in constant contact with a great many other 
11.Demographic
can be applied to whole
or to groups defined by
such as education,nationality,religion and 
12.The authors warned that their
,published in the June issue of Social Psychiatryand Psychiatric Epidemiology,depended on
by mothers about their children’s
,and that the mothers’emotional
might have affected those reports.
13.It can be shown in
that cycling is the cheapest,most convenient,and most environmentally desirable form of
in towns,but such cold
do not mean much on a
winter morning.
14.Its shared knowledge is vicarious
;by this
we enlarge our
of what it means to be human,of the corporate and interdependentnature of
.
15.It is a
between those who believe that
is a matter of making meaningfor the learners on the one hand,and those who
that the function of educationis to facilitate the process whereby
make their own meaning,on the otherhand.
16.Those
require a great deal of contact with
who can engage in
that are quiet and peaceful—far from the madding crowd,far from
and businessassociates.
17.The
play out for us
which are not present to our senses,and therebyguard the past and create the future—a
that does not yet exist,and may nevercome to exist in that
.
18.Under either
,the
would specify the desired,destination furnishing
to a computer
in the beginning of the trip.
19.Since,however,a great deal of the world’s
must be done
in
,it isimportant that we take every precaution to ventilate our
properly.
20.In fact,the
ventilation of a
is one of the first
for good
.
答案解析
1.height→high/peak。名词误用。high可以用作名词,意为“高峰”“高水准”“最高纪录”。height可以作“极点,顶点”解释。他们把男女的婚龄降了下来,使出生率达到了20世纪的高峰。
2.B。不可数名词误用。paper在此处是物质名词,属于不可数名词,故没有复数形式。其用作复数时,意为“报纸,文件”。
3.crop→crops。可数名词单复数误用。crop是可数名词,前面有两个形容词充当其定语,且根据句意,此处应该不是表示一种农作物,故应将crop改成crops。
4.seven-years→seven-year。修饰名词时,这种结构中的量词以单数出现。
5.C。可数名词复数形式误用。woman playwright的复数形式应为women playwrights。因此woman应改为women。
6.D。可数名词单复数误用。outline是可数名词。树影与屋影,trees and houses是两样事物,outline也应使用复数形式。
7.C。不可数名词单复数误用。physics作为学科讲时,为不可数名词,physicses应改为physics。
8.C。可数名词单复数误用。era意为“时代”,尤其用来指以特殊环境、特殊事件或特殊人物为标志的一段时间,是可数名词。根据前面的冠词an判定,era应该用单数形式。
9.B。可数名词单复数误用。many a等于many,但是其后的名词必须为可数名词的单数形式。故doctors应改为doctor。
10.C。可数名词单复数误用。a number of后须用名词复数,因此,role应改为roles。
11.C。可数名词单复数误用。名词后面有such as词组修饰,应该是复数概念,所以用criterion的复数形式criteria。考生应当熟悉一些常用的外来词的复数形式,并了解这些外来词单数变复数的规律,如:stratum—strata,alumnus—alumni,crisis—crises等。
12.C。可数名词单复数误用。此处的experience是可数名词,根据前面的their,应改为experiences。
13.C。可数名词单复数误用。根据上文可以看出是经过多次计算得出结论,而不是经过一次实验得出数据,进而得出结论。calculation应改为calculations。
14.C。不可数名词复数误用。将understandings改为understanding,因为在作为“对……的理解”意思时,understanding是一个不可数名词。
15.D。可数名词单复数误用。该句中动词使用了表示复数意义的make,代词用了表示复数意义的their,所以名词不能用单数,也要改成相应的复数形式。
16.D。可数名词单复数误用。分析句子结构client和business associates为并列成分,再根据those,associates等复数形式,可知client应为复数形式,改成clients。
17.B。可数名词单复数误用。此句中包含一个which引导的定语从句,修饰event,从句中的几个并列动词are,guard,create都用了原形,因此其先行词应该是复数形式events。
18.A。可数名词单复数误用。either意为“任一的”,修饰单数名词,其后的名词scheme应是单数形式,而不用复数形式。
19.A。不可数名词复数误用。分析句子结构和句意,work在这里意为“工作”,是不可数名词。因此,works应改为work。
20.B。bedroom为可数名词,根据前面的冠词a判定,应该用单数形式bedroom。