Matching verbs to collective nouns

Introduction

For the question How many people are in your family? a typical response is My family have five people. A native speaker intuitively sees this as incorrect, even though they may not be able to tell you why. But in this case, My family has five people, would have been the correct response. But why? Families have more than one person, right? Nothing seems to confuse students more than choosing the right singular or plural verb to use collective nouns. What makes it worse is that depending on the situation, you can often choose between both. 

Collective nouns

A collective noun is a noun that is made up of more than one person, animal, place, idea or thing, which stand for a group or collection. They include words such as audience, committee, police, crew, family, government, group, team, jury, class, organization, herd, army, council,  panel, board, flock, staff, choir, orchestra...

How to use


1. In American English, most collective nouns are treated as singular, with a singular verb:

Examples:

  •  The whole family was at the table. [singular verb]

2. In British English

2.1. Collective nouns + Singular verbs

We use singular verbs with collective nouns when we think of the noun as a single, impersonal unit. This means that each member in the group is doing the same thing.

Examples:

  •  The whole family was at the table. (And they do the same thing)
  • My family is going on holiday for Christmas. (All members are doing the same thing)
  • The herd of zebra is running for safety. (They are running together as one unit.)

2.2. Collective nouns + plural verbs

We use plural verbs with collective nouns when we think of the group as individuals, all doing different things, or we want to emphasize the differences that are occurring in the group.

  • The family are doing different jobs around the house today. (Each individual member of the family is doing something different.)
  • The team are eating sandwiches for dinner. (They probably all have different kinds of sandwiches and they all aren’t eating the exact same way at the same time.)

We often use plural verbs when we talk about collective nouns doing people-like things including, eating, wanting & feeling for example.
3. Collective nouns which are always  used with a plural verb
There are a few collective nouns which are always  used with a plural verb (in both British and American English), the commonest of which are police  and people:

example:

  • She’s happy with the way the police have handled the case.

    She’s happy with the way the police has handled the case.

  •  It's been my experience that people are generally forgiving.

    It's been my experience that people is generally forgiving.

4. Some Collective Nouns That Are Always Singular

Everyone, everybody, no one, and nobody are always singular.

  • Everyone is entitled to an opinion.
  • No one wants to hear John’s crazy ideas for waste recycling.