grammarcomparatives

Grammarcomparatives is the study of the grammatical category used to express comparison of quantity, degree, or value between two or more entities. In English, comparatives are commonly formed for adjectives and adverbs to indicate a higher degree relative to another item. Forms include the suffixes -er and -est for simple, one-syllable adjectives (tall, taller, tallest) and the use of more and most for longer or less easily compressed adjectives and adverbs (careful, more careful, most careful; quickly, more quickly, most quickly). Irregular forms also exist, such as good, better, best; bad, worse, worst; and far, farther/farthest or further/furthest. For two equal items, comparison is marked with as...as: as tall as, as quickly as. For inequality, the marker than is used: taller than, more quickly than. Comparatives can modify adjectives or adverbs and may appear before the noun in simple constructions (the taller tree) or after the verb as a predicate (the tree is taller than the other).

Some adjectives and adverbs are non-gradable in certain contexts, meaning they do not readily take comparative forms (for example, perfect or unique in many senses). The comparative form interacts with syntax and discourse, often influenced by determiners, quantifiers, and degree modifiers that accompany the expression. Cross-linguistic note: languages differ in how comparatives are formed, using a range of suffixes, separate words, or periphrastic constructions. The term is widely used in grammar descriptions, language-learning materials, and linguistic analysis of degree phrases and their usage.