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State Verbs

State Verbs

This is something I'm not very ugh...knowledgeable on, but someone asked if I could do a chapter on State of Being verbs, so I've done a little bit of research and I'm going to explain it as best as I can.

A state verb is when a verb describes a state, and not an action. We don't use the same tense for this, because it's grammatically in correct.

For example if you were writing in past tense the following would be wrong:

1."They had been played all night," He said.

2.She was read a good book.

3.I am hated school.

Even though they are all past tense, like the rest of the writing, it sounds wrong. From just reading them, they should sound wrong.

The correct way is:

1."They had been playing all night," he said.

2.She was reading a good book.

3.I hate school.

Technically, MacDonald's "I'm loving it" is wrong, but the company had made the saying famous. Love is a state verb, so we should be saying "I love it". ( write 'I'm loving it' into a micrsoft word and it suggests changing it to 'I love it')

State verbs generally fall into 4 groups.

Emotion: love, hate, want, need

Possession: have, own, want, belong

Sense: See, hear, smell, feel

Thought: know, believe, remember


Even though I said at the start state verbs are not action verbs, they can be both state and action verbs. Yes, confusing, I know.

Example:

1.I have a cat -State verb showing possession, however doesn't come under the possession category most of the time.

2.I am having a shower - action verb meaning, in this case, 'taking'

3.I think you are a loser -A state verb meaning my 'opinion.'

Most state verbs are easily distinguished by sound. If you write something and it sounds wrong than it's probably is. Rereading words out loud can fix most of it. In school we never did anything with state verbs although, when I was looking at this stuff most of it I knew was wrong/right. This will be harder for people that speak different languages, but if you persist and practise it will get easier.

For those of you who want to test out if you know state verbs, taking the following test: At the bottom there's a test where you click correct or incorrect. Self-explanatory really-I got all of them right. It's not too hard.

If you are still confused you can find articles online that can explain this way better than i can. The link for the test has information too, which is where I sourced my information so check it out if you want.

Does this make sense? Or are people completely confused.