'conditional' forms in English

[Alison C Crutchley]

Dear all
Can anyone give me an idea (or point me in the direction of something
published) about a) acquisition of and b) regional variants of
'third conditional' constructions such as 'If he'd stopped at the garage he
wouldn't have run out of petrol'? Children we are assessing have produced the
following forms (among others) and I'd appreciate any ideas!

* if he would have x-ed, he would have y-ed
* if he wouldn't have x-ed, then y wouldn't have happened
* if he didn't do that then that wouldn't have happened
* if the girl had have fed the rabbit earlier...
* if she didn't have opened the rabbit cage...
* If he was filling up his car with petrol then he wouldn't need a tub with it
in

Thanks very much! Alison Crutchley


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Dr Alison Crutchley
Centre for Human Communication and Deafness, [formerly CAEDSP]
School of Education, University of Manchester,
Oxford Road, Manchester M13 9PL, UK.

Tel: +44 (0)161 275 3390
Fax: +44 (0)161 275 3373

alison.crutchley at man.ac.uk
Visit the Centre website: http://www.man.ac.uk/CHCD/
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