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In formal writing, which sentence would be a better choice to imply "I appreciated that they had thought of me"?

  1. I appreciated their thinking of me.
  2. I appreciated them thinking of me.

Is there a subtle difference in the two constructions? To mean that sentence number 1 stresses on the act of thinking and sentence number 2 stresses on the people who are thinking? Or can both be used to mean the same thing?

  • Don't stress yourself with overthinking on this one. Both versions are in common use, and mean exactly the same. It's just different syntax. – FumbleFingers Jul 14 '17 at 16:52
  • The first is a gerund with a possessive pronoun; the second is a participial clause. As FumbleFingers said, they are interchangeable. – Khuldraeseth na'Barya Jul 14 '17 at 17:11
  • The syntax: "Their thinking of me" is ambiguous. If say, the adjective "constant" was added, then "thinking" would be a noun and "their constant thinking of me" a noun phrase.. But if the adverb "constantly" was added, "thinking" could only be a verb so "their constantly thinking of me" would be a gerund-participial clause. Your other example can only be a clause since there's no possibility of modifying "thinking" with an adjective. – BillJ Jul 15 '17 at 06:06
  • 'I don't like his singing' and 'I don't like him singing' are not always interchangeable, for the reason you give. 'His speech is very pleasant, but I don't like his singing' where the nouny version is required, but 'He should be at home with that sore throat – I don't like/want him singing', where the more verby (ACC-ing) construction is easily the better choice. But this has been covered here before. – Edwin Ashworth Jul 15 '17 at 11:03

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