Exam question 3 · Excuse me, and good manners at the table

Identify the principal reason why talking or laughing with food in the mouth is discouraged.

Mova's choice: option 3 · The right answer: option 3 · right ✓ · Who acts: you, talking · What happens: identify, talk, laugh, be · To what, where: principal reason

This is exam question 3 of lesson 127 «Excuse me, and good manners at the table» of the everyday course of Mova's primary school, asked in stiff, formal language. The page gives the question's syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause, then the 4 options as the student saw them, each with its tree and pragmatics. Every text is parsed by Mova itself. How the student answered it, with the score of every option and why: the test at school.

The question

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Identify	identify	VERB	Mood=Imp VerbForm=Fin	root	root
2	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 reason	det
3	principal	principal	ADJ	Degree=Pos	4 reason	amod
4	reason	reason	NOUN	Number=Sing	1 Identify	obj
5	why	why	ADV	PronType=Int	15 discouraged	advmod
6	talking	talk	VERB	VerbForm=Ger	15 discouraged	csubj
7	or	or	CCONJ	_	8 laughing	cc
8	laughing	laugh	VERB	VerbForm=Ger	6 talking	conj
9	with	with	ADP	_	10 food	case
10	food	food	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 laughing	obl
11	in	in	ADP	_	13 mouth	case
12	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	13 mouth	det
13	mouth	mouth	NOUN	Number=Sing	10 food	nmod
14	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	15 discouraged	cop
15	discouraged	discouraged	ADJ	Degree=Pos	1 Identify	advcl
16	.	.	PUNCT	_	1 Identify	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	other	roles by
1	identify	imperative	you not said here	the principal reason		vn characterize-29.2-1-1 «NP V NP S_ING»: agent=Agent reason=Theme
2	talk	gerund				vn talk-37.5 «NP V»: agent=Agent
3	laugh	gerund			with food in the mouth	vn nonverbal_expression-40.2 «NP V»: agent=Agent
4	is	present	talking		discouraged property	tree rules

One row per clause the reader finds. «not said here»: a role filled from the clause above. «roles by»: a VerbNet class and frame when one fits the verb, else the reader's rules on the tree.

The options

Option 1

It makes the food lose its taste

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	It	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 makes	nsubj
2	makes	make	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 food	det
4	food	food	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 makes	obj
5	lose	lose	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	2 makes	xcomp
6	its	its	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	7 taste	nmod:poss
7	taste	taste	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 lose	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	roles by
1	make	present	It	the food	tree rules
2	lose	infinitive	the food not said here	food's taste	vn succeed-74-3-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent taste=Eventuality
3	taste		food		nom taste «cognition transitive»: poss=agent

Option 2

It causes the food to grow cold

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	It	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 causes	nsubj
2	causes	cause	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 food	det
4	food	food	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 causes	obj
5	to	to	PART	_	6 grow	mark
6	grow	grow	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	2 causes	advcl
7	cold	cold	ADJ	Degree=Pos	6 grow	xcomp

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	cause	present	It	the food					vn engender-27.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Precondition food=Patient
2	grow	to-infinitive						cold property	vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme

Option 3 · ← Mova's choice · ✓ the right answer

It raises the chance of choking

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	It	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 raises	nsubj
2	raises	raise	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 chance	det
4	chance	chance	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 raises	obj
5	of	of	ADP	_	6 choking	case
6	choking	choking	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 chance	nmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	raise	present	It	the chance of choking					vn put_direction-9.4 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent chance=Theme
2	chance		choking						nom chance «state intransitive»: of=agent

Option 4

It makes the meal last much longer

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	It	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 makes	nsubj
2	makes	make	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 meal	det
4	meal	meal	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 makes	obj
5	last	last	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	2 makes	xcomp
6	much	much	ADV	_	7 longer	advmod
7	longer	long	ADV	Degree=Cmp	2 makes	advmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	make	present	It	the meal				long property	tree rules
2	last	present	the meal not said here						vn cost-54.2 «NP V NP.value»: agent=Theme

Text: the tests of Mova's primary school, written for Mova (world/data/school/), as the course runner gave them to the student. Trees: Mova's own parse — the en model on the CPU, when the site is built — not checked by a teacher; they may be wrong. Frames: Mova's frames reader (prag), each text read on its own. Elamur Cosmic License.

This page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/questions/everyday/127-excuse-me-and-table-manners/e3/