than in "commoner than realised"

Question

Sentence:SLDs are commoner than realised and affect about 10% of children.Question:What part of speech is than here?  And could you please do some grammatical analysis of this sentence?Thanks in advance!

Clive · Accepted Answer

Hi,

SLDs are commoner than realised and affect about 10% of children.

Question:

What part of speech is than here? And could you please do some grammatical analysis of this sentence?

SLDs subject of two main clauses

are verb

commoner than realised adjectival phrase, in which 'than' is a conjunction connecting the two parts of the comparison

and conjunction connecting two main clauses

affect verb

about adverb, modifying the phrase that follows

10% of children. object phrase

Best wishes, Clive

Maple · Answer

Thanks for your very helpful elaboration , Clive!![C]

commoner than realised adjectival phrase, in which 'than' is a conjunction connecting the two partsof the comparison

Thus we have the fact that "commoner than realised" is an adjectival phrase.

Do you think the following, its similar expressions acceptable?

commoner than thought

fewer than realised

scarcer than imagined

Maple

Yankee · Answer

Yes, they're OK.

more than anticipated
less than expected
more difficult than anticipated
higher than originally quoted

Maple · Answer

Thanks for your confirmation, Amy! [C]

Maple

than in "commoner than realised"

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