Hi. I found this sentence in an English dictionary - Women make up 56% of the student numbers. My questions are:
Thank you.
It can be “the number of students”, but your two options are incorrect.
This would not be my first choice, but it does get some Google hits, so I think it is ok - the Latrobe Valley Express can’t be wrong, right? latrobevalleyexpress.com.au/ … y-locally/
[quote=“Dee3”]
Hi. I found this sentence in an English dictionary - Women make up 56% of the student numbers. [color=blue]That’s a clumsy sentence.
[color=blue]‘Fifty-six percent of the students are women.’ is a much better sentence.
2) Can I say, “The smoker numbers are decreasing[color=blue].”?quote]
[color=blue]No, say ‘The number of smokers is increasing.’
Thank you for the comment, Luschen and Canadian45.
As the subject shows, the word “numbers” caught my attention.
I came across another sentence using “numbers” in the same way in a newspaper article. It was like this: … was the primary cause of the decline in visitor numbers.
Do you say or hear someone say “visitor numbers” instead of “the number of visitors?”
Is this part of the English flexibility or usage limited to what, written language or newspaper terms to save word numbers … ? Wow, magical power of “numbers” has caused me to use it inadvertently. Short words are easier to use.
What do you think about “numbers?”
I really think that “the number of visitors” is more common than “visitor numbers” - it strikes me that a lot of the hits for Google searches of “visitor numbers” or “smoker numbers” are headlines, where they are forced to use the shortest phrase possible.