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I generally pride myself on having the solutions to grammar questions like this one, but I can't figure out what is right.

I am writing a sentence about evaluating three different options for some task:

"In this chapter, the performance of the first choice, second choice, and third choice __ studied."

Should "is" or "are" fill in that blank?

Now, clearly the subject of the verb is "the performance." The different options are objects of the preposition "of." By that logic, "the performance...is studied" makes sense.

Nevertheless, saying out loud: "the performance of the first choice, second choice, and third choice is studied," just doesn't sound right to me.

What's the correct solution here?

marcman
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    Hello, marcman, and wlecome! You could say "The respective performances of the first, second, and third choices are studied". Cheers! – Conrado May 14 '20 at 17:33
  • Oh I like that! Sounds much cleaner. Am I right, though, that in the sentence I gave, "is" is the correct choice? – marcman May 14 '20 at 17:33
  • Sorry, I don't know--that's why I suggested an un-ambiguously plural subject. There are some related posts here: https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/117346/agreement-with-compound-subjects-joined-by-and, and https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/521554/plural-or-singular-verb-when-plural-subject-is-separated-by-an-and. Also a wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compound_subject. If those articles don't make it clear, you could edit your question pointing out the complicated parts. Cheers! – Conrado May 14 '20 at 17:39

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What is wrong is performance in the singular. Each choice has its own performance:

In this chapter, the performances of the first choice, second choice, and third choice are studied.

If you meant that the choices combined have one collective performance, then:

In this chapter, the performance of the first, second, and third choices is studied.

Tinfoil Hat
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  • There's a difference in meaning, though: In "In this chapter, the performance of the first, second, and third choices is studied", the (performance of all three choices together) is all lumped together in one, without distinguishing the individual performances of each one separately. If the performances are studied, they may be taken separately and compared with one another. – Conrado May 14 '20 at 21:13
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    @Conrado: Yes, that is why performances needs to be plural — in the original sentence, there is one performance for each performer. That's three performances. If you want a singular verb, you need one performance, as shown in the second example. – Tinfoil Hat May 14 '20 at 22:01
  • Sorry, @TinfoilHat, I didn't read carefully the first time. Cheers! – Conrado May 14 '20 at 22:06