Unsure how to explain this

[Nerrad]

Students asked me about the following question:

How long do people take for lunch?

Why is it not:

How long does people take for lunch?

Cheers,
Nerrad

 

[susiedqq]

"People" is a collective noun, so it uses the plural verb.

Change the question to a statement to see it more clearly. :lol:

(They do) eat lunch.

Singular is (He does) eat lunch.

 

[Stilo]

:roll:
The correct form is " How long do people take for lunch".
You are talking about a group therefore in everyday English it is taken as a singular identity. I will stand corrected if I am wrong,but "How long does people take for lunch" is not gramatically correct.

 

[BobK]

I think the area of doubt here is caused by the fact that as well as the active and passive voices, there is a middle voice alternative:

Active: 'People take an hour for lunch.'
Passive: 'An hour is taken for lunch.'
Middle: 'Lunch takes an hour.'

So in your question, people do the taking; but sometimes (when there's a middle voice construction) "lunch" behaves like the subject (which suggests - wrongly - that the verb should be in the singular). This sort of confusion is the price we pay for the flexibility of a verb like "take".

b