下面一段选自2015年高考英语四川卷的阅读理解:
He told people at a conference, “There have been a couple of studies suggesting they are increasing their song output at night and during the day they are still singing. Singing is a costly behaviour and it takes energy. So by increasing their song output, there might be some costs of energy. ”
我对其中的Singing is a costly behaviour不理解,behaviour 不是不可数名词吗?它前面怎么可以用不定冠词呢?请专家老师解释和指导,非常感谢!
曾老师:
behaviour通常是用作不可数名词的,但有时也用作可数名词。请看《牛津高阶英语词典》上的解释:
【U, C】 the way a person, an animal, a plant, a chemical, etc. behaves or functions in a particular situation:
the behaviour of insects / dolphins / chromosomes ◆ studying human and animal behaviour ◆ (technical) to study learned behaviours and attitudes
▲ 再提供两个词典例句:
It is regarded as a natural behavior that a man helps the old down stairs. 帮助老人下楼被认为是理所当然的行为。《简明英汉词典》
These eating patterns are a learned behavior.这些进食模式是习得性行为。《柯林斯高级英汉双解学习词典》(第5版)
黎老师:
很多词典都把 behaviour 作不可数名词处理。作为学生,最好也把 behaviour 作不可数名词使用。但是,把 behaviour 作可数名词的例子也有,例如:
【U, C】the way a person, an animal, a plant, a chemical, etc. behaves or functions in a particular situation (人、动植物、化学品等的)表现方式,活动方式
(《牛津高阶英汉双解词典》第8版p.167)
以下例句摘自《柯林斯高级英汉双解学习词典》p.219, 2011年7月第1版:
You can refer to a typical and repeated way of behaving as a behaviour.
These eating patterns are a learned behavior. 这些进食模式是习得性行为。
It will be many years before anyone cao predict a hurricane's behavior with much accuracy. 要能够相当准确地预测出飓风的特性尚需多年。