A question about grammar

Question

In following sentences there are both "as" after "times" to express the "-fold" meaning (such as five-fold). However, I don't understand what structure or words may be followed after "as". In fact, "a five-fold risk of dying from heart disease", which may make sense for me to translate it into Chinese. But "five times as many heart attacks" and " twice as likely to die", which I can't express in chinese, even difficult to understand.

"A study found that men with hostile personalities had almost five times as many heart attacks as those who showed little anger."

"The findings suggest that infants with two copies of the klotho gene variant are slightly more than twice as likely to die before the age of 65."

Thanks for your assistance !

Usenet · Accepted Answer

[nq:1]In following sentences there are both "as" after "times" to express the "-fold" meaning (such as five-fold). However, I don't understand what structure or words may be followed after "as". In[/nq]
That should be "may follow 'as'".
[nq:1]fact, "a five-fold risk of dying from heart disease", which may make sense for me to translate it into Chinese. But "five times as many heart attacks" and " twice as likely to die", which I can't express in chinese, even difficult to understand.[/nq]
You are making the typical mistake of the inexperienced translator: attempting to translate literally from one language into another. If you can translate a sentence that uses "an X-fold risk of Z happening", then you can translate each sentence. You just have to add the comparison made or implied in a way that resembles the Chinese structure.
[nq:1]"A study found that men with hostile personalities had almost five times as many heart attacks as those who showed ... copies of the klotho gene variant are slightly more than twice as likely to die before the age of 65."[/nq]
You are missing the important fact that "X times as many" and "Y times as likely" are set phrases in English. It isn't a question of "what comes after 'as' as much as it is a question of what these "as"-phrases mean.
Translating these sentences into scientific Chinese-English:

"A study found that men with hostile personalities had almost a five-fold risk of having a heart attack compared {to/with} those who showed little anger".
"The findings suggest that infants with two copies of the klotho gene variant have a slightly larger than two-fold risk of dying before the age of 65 compared {to/with} infants with one copy".

Usenet · Answer

[nq:1]In following sentences there are both "as" after "times" to express the "-fold" meaning (such as five-fold). However, I don't ... found that men with hostile personalities had almost five times as many heart attacks as those who showed little anger."[/nq]
If Group A was 50 people, group B was 10 people. If Group A was 150 people, Group B was 30 people. Five-fold means, five times as much. Multiply the smaller by five.
[nq:1]"The findings suggest that infants with two copies of the klotho gene variant are slightly more than twice as likely to die before the age of 65."[/nq]
Now, there you are talking about risks or chances, which might be expressed as fractions, decimals, percentages, or other. "Twice as likely" still works out to be, multiply by two, but you have to watch the expression.
If the odds had been one out of six, now they are one out of three. If the odds had been 0.14, now they are 0.28.
"More than twice as likely" means that the multiplication factor was not a perfect two but something like 2.1 or 2.4.

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