Dave's ESL Cafe's Student Discussion Forums

[dido4]

I got the sentenses from a grmma book.

Which do you think is Ben?
What animal do you think is cute?

1.Are the sentences right?

2.Do they have to be rewrite like this:
Which do you think Ben is?
What animal do you think cute is?

Some, indirect sentences, like the following sentences:

What do you think that is?
Where does Ted think he can hide?
How old do you think I am?
What day does he think your birthday is?

I don't know the rules.
I mean I don't understand why the top 2 sentences are written like that, not like this:

Who do you think I am?

Thank you

[Lorikeet]

I will try to explain this, but anyone else can jump in if it's not a good enough explanation.

When we make question-word questions (When, Where, Why, Who, etc.) we leave the subject questions with the same order as a sentence, for example:

John is tired. Who is tired?
Something happened. What happened?
Peter went home early. Who went home early?

When we make question-word questions about the predicate (the verb and what is after the verb) we change to question order. For example:

John went to the store. Where did John go?
Peter had chicken for dinner. What did Peter have for dinner?
Alice goes to school at 8. When does Alice go to school?
Peter wants to talk to Mary. Who does Peter want to talk to?

If we put a "do you think" inside the sentence, the "do you think" is the question part, and the rest of the sentence goes back to sentence order. For example:

Where did John go? Where do you think John went?
What did Peter have for dinner? What do you think Peter had for dinner?
When does Alice go to school? When do you think Alice goes to school?
Who does Peter want to talk to? Who do you think Peter wants to talk to?

Notice, when you ask a subject question, there is no change in order. Therefore, there is no change for the "do you think" question. For example:

Who is tired? Who do you think is tired?
What happened? What do you think happened?
Who went home early? Who do you think went home early?

In your example, "What animal do you think is cute?" The normal sentence would be "XXXX (animal) is cute." The question would be "What animal is cute?" (Subject question, no change in order) With "do you think" it would be "What animal do you think is cute?"

I hope this helps.

(Oh, and I think both "Which do you think is Ben?" and "Which do you think Ben is?" are possible, just as "That one is Ben." and "Ben is that one." are both possible.)