When do we use the gerund and when the noun form?

Question

I ran into this sentence written by a student: there are different costs in face-to-face classes, such as the cost of commuting between university and home. Can we replace commuting with commute because commute is also a noun like the gerund 'commuting'? Also, when a noun form exists, when do we use the noun and when the gerund? Is either of them preferable? I couldn't find the answer anywhere I looked. Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

There are two points here.

Firstly if the noun were to be used it would need an article, usually the definite article. This would give "...the cost of the commute between university and home".

Secondly, and more importantly, the gerund and the noun have slightly different meanings in this context. The noun implies a specific commute, from a particular suburb say, whereas the gerund refers to the concept of commuting or the habitual practice of commuting on the part of students wherever they live and study.

For example if I was talking about life in Smallville I could say "The cost of the commute to Megalopolis is quite high" because, even though many people commute from Smallville to Megalopolis, their costs are roughly similar. However, if I was talking about a business based in Megalopolis I could say "The cost of commuting from the surrounding small towns is a factor limiting our ability to attract staff" because the potential employees live in different towns and each town will have a different commuting cost.

The gerund form can be much more general than that, which is probably what is meant by the quote. The quote probably refers to universities in general and to the costs of commuting from all the places where students live.

Answer 2

“Commuting between ... home” is a gerundial noun phrase; its use is grammatically justified as such.

“Commute between ... home” is a noun phrase that could be clearly be used a slightly modified statement such as “... the cost of the commute between university and home”. Omitting “the” makes the statement parallel to “We retreated because of the cost of attack”, an acceptable alternative to “... of the cost of attacking”.

Despite this parallel I find use of “commute” without “the” to be awkward. See https://www.grammar-monster.com/glossary/verbal_nouns.htm