Identifying antecedents
11a. The antecedent in the following sentence is Doctors: Doctors should schedule more time for patients so they do not spend so much time in the waiting room.
11b. The antecedent in the following sentence is patients: Doctors should schedule more time for patients so they do not spend so much time in the waiting room.
My answer is: 11b
Right! :-)
The antecedent is a word, phrase, or clause that a pronoun replaces or refers to in a sentence. In this case, we are looking for the antecedent of the pronoun "they" in the sentence "Doctors should schedule more time for patients so they do not spend so much time in the waiting room."
To find the antecedent, we need to identify the noun or noun phrase that "they" is replacing. In this sentence, "they" is referring to a group of people who are expected to not spend too much time in the waiting room. By analyzing the sentence, we can see that the pronoun "they" is replacing the noun "patients." Therefore, the antecedent in this sentence is "patients."
So, your answer of 11b is correct. The antecedent in the sentence "Doctors should schedule more time for patients so they do not spend so much time in the waiting room" is "patients."