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Jo
Yes or no question and affirmo-negative question
1yes or no question
你(nǐ)喝(hē)咖(kā)啡(fēi)吗(mɑ)？（Do you drink coffee?)
最(zuì)近(jìn)你(nǐ)忙(mánɡ)吗(mɑ)？(Are you busy recently?)
2affirmo-negative question
你(nǐ)喝(hē)不(bu)喝(hē)咖(kā)啡(fēi)？(Do you drink coffee?)
最(zuì)近(jìn)你(nǐ)忙(mánɡ)不(bu)忙(mánɡ)？(Are you busy recently?)
These two kind of questions' English translations are same and they are used in the same way. Seldom Chinese people can tell the difference between these two kinds questions. But if you pay more attention, you can find out a very little difference between these two sentences.
Please have a try!
(Hint:the difference is in the answers.)
May 4, 2008 10:52 AM
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Comments · 2
Normally we can ignore the difference between these two kind question.
Let's have a look of the answers of these two questions.
1 Yes or no question
你(nǐ)喝(hē)咖(kā)啡(fēi)吗(mɑ)？（Do you drink coffee?) 喝(hē)/不（bù）喝(hē) or是（ shì）/不是（ búshì）[yes/no]
最(zuì)近(jìn)你(nǐ)忙(mánɡ)吗(mɑ)？(Are you busy recently?) 忙(mánɡ)/不（bù）忙(mánɡ)or 是（ shì）/不是（ búshì）[yes/no]
In Yes or no question we can use repeating verb or adjective and yes or no to answer question.
But in affirmo-negative question, we must choose affirm or negative form to answer and can't use yes or no.
你(nǐ)喝(hē)不(bu)喝(hē)咖(kā)啡(fēi)？(Do you drink coffee?) 喝(hē)/不（bù）喝(hē)
最(zuì)近(jìn)你(nǐ)忙(mánɡ)不(bu)忙(mánɡ)？(Are you busy recently?) 忙(mánɡ)/不（bù）忙(mánɡ)
The answer can't be 是（ shì）/不是（ búshì）
In Chinese people can repeat the verb or adjective to mean yes or no.However Chinese people prefer to repeat verb or adjective to indicate yes or no. That's why there is no big difference between these two kinds of questions.
May 5, 2008
I already knew both of the question forms but I didn‘t realized that there is a difference between them.
May 4, 2008
