生活美語《It reports the results of a survey ..》
It reports the results of a survey of cohabiting couplesIt reports the results of a survey of cohabiting couples
報導披露了同居男女調查結果
Hallie：I always thought that the main reason a couple decided to cohabit was because they were thinking of getting married at some time in the future.
哈利：我向來以為，一對男女決定同居，主要是因為他們打算日後結婚。
Aaron：That's what I thought too. Don't they?
亞倫：我也是那樣想。不是這樣的嗎？
Hallie：Not according to this article I've been reading. It reports the results of a survey of cohabiting couples which are quite surprising.
哈利：我讀到的這篇報導說不是。報導披露了同居男女調查結果，頗為出人意料。
Aaron：Well if couples decide to live together without marriage in mind, why do they do it?
亞倫：假如男女同居卻不打算結婚，那為什麼同居呢？
Hallie：Well of course some of them are thinking of marriage, but a lot of them do it for convenience.
哈利：啊，有些人當然是有意結婚的，但不少只是求方便而同居。
Aaron：Convenience? That doesn't sound very romantic.
亞倫：方便？這似乎不很浪漫。
Hallie：Well, they are attracted to each other but that's not necessarily the most important thing.
哈利：他們喜歡對方，但那未必是最重要的一點。
多學一點點 未婚同居是因為……
哈利說：I always thought that the main reason a couple decided to cohabit was because they were thinking of getting married。Reason 是「原因」，because是「因為」，The main reason was because they were thinking of getting married直譯是「主要原因是因為他們打算結婚」。讀者一定會說「原因」、「因為」二詞宜刪去其一。
事實上，英文學者也有反對the reason is because這說法的。布雷姆納(John B Bremner) Words on Words一書就說，The reason he failed is because he didn't study（他不及格是因為沒有讀書）這句話，應改為The reason he failed is that he didn't study 或He failed because he didn't study。同意這論點的人不少，假如你不想被他們批評，最好不用the reason is because 說法。
不過，這說法卻是約定俗成的，不但常用於口頭，也見於大文學家筆下，例如杜萊登(John Dryden)寫過The strongest reason is because I can't help it（最大的原因，是我忍不住），艾狄生(Joseph Addison)也寫過The reason is because they consider every animal as a brother or sister in disguise（原因是他們視動物為喬裝的兄弟姊妹）。
Cohabit由字首(prefix) co（共同）和inhabit（居住）二字組成，本義是「住在一起」，但一般是指男女未婚而像夫妻般同居，有時也會用來說「共存」，例如：(1) The house mouse can cohabit with man and adapts very well to urbanization（家鼠可以和人類一起生活，而且很適應城市環境）。(2)He cohabited with her for two years before they got married（他們同居兩年之後才結婚）。
