Question

Fill in the blank with the correct option:
Don’t you agree that this is the _________ problem of the two?
a) serious
b) more serious
c) most serious
d) seriouser

Answer 1

Hint: In the latter part of the sentence, a comparison is being made. This means that the word needed is a comparative adjective, which can fulfill the comparison being made.

Complete answer:
 An adjective is a word or phrase naming an attribute, added to or grammatically related to a noun to modify or describe it. Its semantic role is to change the information given by the noun. In short, it lends description to the noun. They are of various types such as demonstrative, possessive, qualitative, quantitative, etc.

a) Positive - The positive degree is the simplest degree of comparison. It has no special ending. It offers no comparison, just the existence of a particular quality.
b) Comparative - This degree compares two or more things to find which one exists in a more
or less degree. It either has the word ‘more’ before the adjective or has the suffix ‘-er’ after
the adjective.
c) Superlative - This degree denotes the most extreme form of the adjective. It is formed by
using the article ‘the’ before the adjective and adding either ‘most’ before the adjective or the suffix ‘-est’ after the adjective.

For the given sentence, we need a comparative degree for the given blank.
Now, we know what we are looking for. Let’s look at the given options-
a) serious - This is a positive degree adjective as it has no suffix and it has no word preceding it like ‘more’ or ‘most’. This is not the required answer. So, this is an incorrect option.
b) more serious - This is a comparative adjective as it has a word preceding it, i.e. ‘more’. This is the required answer. So, this is the correct option.
c) most serious - This is a superlative degree adjective as it has a word preceding it, i.e. ‘most’. This is not the required answer. So, this is an incorrect option.
d) seriouser - This word is not grammatically correct and such a word does not exist in the English language. This is not the required answer. So, this is an incorrect option.

Note:
 Look at the given sentence and note that there are two objects that are being compared. The blanks are after verbs. This means that the blank should be filled by a specific part of speech. Choose the correct option accordingly.