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I am having problem with how to use been and being properly in essays. I came across following sentence and would like to learn through this example about the difference.

  • It can be seen commonly in every part of the world that women tend to be alone than being married.

  • It can be seen commonly in every part of the world that women tend to be alone than been married.

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than been married is completely ungrammatical, but than being married is. Whenever been is used, the verb to have is involved one way or the other. To put it in simple terms, every time you want to use been, you must precede it with one of the forms of the verb to have. Here is the list of all possible combinations:

have been
has been
having been
had been

That's why than been married is not correct. Does this make sense?

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  • It order to check if I get your point correctly, If I write above sentence as follows, would it become grammatically correct? It can be seen commonly in every part of the world that women tend to be alone than have been married.
    – KItis
    Commented Feb 1, 2017 at 14:36
  • No. Typically, "than" can't be followed by a verb in its base form.
    – Michael Rybkin
    Commented Feb 1, 2017 at 14:41

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