comma with 'according to which' [preposition]: findings, atw., they

Farley Hill

Farley Hill

Member
English USA
Greetings,

I wrote this: "Our results confirm previous findings, according to which daughters are more likely to abandon their relationships to fathers than sons."

My proofreader says it needs a comma, like this: "Our results confirm previous findings, according to which, daughters are more likely to abandon their relationships to fathers than sons."

The second version seems wrong to me. Does anyone have a strong opinion about this either way?

Thanks!
 
    • Hi,

    Just my two cents!

    I think the first sentence may be somewhat misleading. When I read to the part, "according to which daughters ....," I feel there could be a group of daughters, among which, some of them may be more likely to abandon their relationship with fathers than sons.

    On the other hand, for the sentence with comma, it is clearer that the subject refered by the phrase, "according to which," is the "previous findings." And the "daughters" here means daughters in general rather than a specific group.

    So, how do you think? This is just how I see it.

    =)
     
    Structurally it doesn't need one: 'according to which the moon is made of green cheese'. But it's up to you whether the possible misreading 'according to which daughters' (like 'depending on which daughters you asked') needs guarding against. If it looks disturbingly ambiguous, a comma wouldn't hurt.
     
    Such drama over being thoughtful to a reader, who does not have the benefit of intonation or slight pauses between spoken words.

    When a comma can make the meaning crystal clear, rather than the reader having to hesitate over the intended meaning...

    I totally agree with the proofreader.
     
    entangledbank said:
    Structurally it doesn't need one: 'according to which the moon is made of green cheese'. But it's up to you whether the possible misreading 'according to which daughters' (like 'depending on which daughters you asked') needs guarding against. If it looks disturbingly ambiguous, a comma wouldn't hurt.
    Click to expand...
    What about here, is here a comma nedded?

    Instead, therefore, we introduce another protocol, the intent locking protocol, according to which no transaction is allowed to acquire a lock on a tuple before first acquiring a lock-probably an intent lock (see the next paragraph)on the relvar that contains it.

    Introduction to Database Systems, J. Date
     
    Do you mean before or after according to which? Before: yes; after: no. I'm as strongly opposed to that one as I was to the one in the OP.
     
    ewie said:
    Do you mean before or after according to which? Before: yes; after: no. I'm as strongly opposed to that one as I was to the one in the OP.
    Click to expand...
    Many thanks. :)
    I meant after according to which.
    What is the role according to which, please?
     
    ewie said:
    That's as close as you're going to get to a rule: If leaving out a comma causes ambiguity, put in a comma.
    Click to expand...

    srk said:
    It links the prepositional phrase "according to" to the noun "findings" through the pronoun "which."
    The phrase "according to findings" means "the findings tell us," or "the findings say."
    Click to expand...
    Many thanks to you both.
     
    taraa said:
    I meant after according to which.
    Click to expand...
    Not a matter of preference - absolutely wrong to put a comma there , as in the OP's sentence. It doesn't resolve ambiguity, it misdirects : the comma prepares the reader for some parenthetical insertion which doesn't appear (e.g. 'according to which, to put it in a nutshell, daughters are more likely...'; 'according to which, if we accept Professor C. Lubowski's definition, no transaction...').
     
    lentulax said:
    Not a matter of preference - absolutely wrong to put a comma there , as in the OP's sentence. It doesn't resolve ambiguity, it misdirects : the comma prepares the reader for some parenthetical insertion which doesn't appear (e.g. 'according to which, to put it in a nutshell, daughters are more likely...'; 'according to which, if we accept Professor C. Lubowski's definition, no transaction...').
    Click to expand...

    I agree with entangled. If there's a danger of misreading, the comma may be desirable. As it is, some may have to read the sentence twice if it's minimally punctuated as lentulax suggests--no, demands.
     
    Many thanks Bennymix.
    lentulax said:
    Not a matter of preference - absolutely wrong to put a comma there , as in the OP's sentence. It doesn't resolve ambiguity, it misdirects : the comma prepares the reader for some parenthetical insertion which doesn't appear (e.g. 'according to which, to put it in a nutshell, daughters are more likely...'; 'according to which, if we accept Professor C. Lubowski's definition, no transaction...').
    Click to expand...
    Many thanks.
     
    bennymix said:
    as lentulax suggests--no, demands.
    Click to expand...
    I don't demand anything - people are free to write whatever they like, whether it's meaningful, gibberish, idiomatic or not, etc. I am answering two specific questions in this thread, consistently with the aims of the forum, to offer advice about standard and idiomatic usage of English. In the first example, "Our results confirm previous findings, according to which daughters are more likely to abandon their relationships to fathers than sons",the OP asks whether a proofreader is right to put a comma after 'which'; the answer, unequivocally, is 'No!' The sentence as written conforms to standard English usage; inserting a comma would lead to a misreading by anyone familiar with standard English usage; and I do not believe any native speaker would have difficulty understanding the sentence as written. In fact, I see no ambiguity at all, and I'd be grateful if anyone who does could explain fully the alternative meaning of this whole sentence (not what part of it might mean in another sentence).

    In the second sentence, "we introduce another protocol, the intent locking protocol, according to which no transaction is allowed to acquire a lock on a tuple before first acquiring a lock-probably an intent lock (see the next paragraph)on the relvar that contains it", no-one has even suggested the possibility of an ambiguity (there is none) ; a comma after 'which' is unequivocally wrong (for the reason I gave; if that's wrong and someone can explain why, I'll retract and apologise for my error). Those who asked the questions are perfectly at liberty to ignore my advice; I don't see any point in giving a tentative opinion, which might mislead those seeking guidance, about something on which I have no doubt.

    In cases of similar structures to these two, where a genuine ambiguity might exist (I can't think of any), I still can't see the point of resolving one possible misreading by punctuating in such a way as to cause anyone used to standard English usage to misread in a different way; if such a genuine ambiguity exists, the sentence needs rewriting.
     
    I totally agree with lentulax.

    Quite apart from the fact that there is no possibility whatsoever of either of the two given examples being anything but unambiguous ("which" is clearly a relative pronoun referring to "findings" in the first example and to "protocol" in the second (#8), and is not a determiner for "daughters" in the first (and in the second there isn't even a candidate noun to which it could be a determiner, that possibility being blocked by "no")), if "which" were intended as a determiner in the first, not only would a comma do more harm than good, but "according to" should have been changed to "depending on", when there would also have been no need for a comma.
     
    You must log in or register to reply here.
    Back
    Top