"alcohol intake" and "alcohol's effect" ?

Question

We say "alcohol intake" even without using the S in the end of alcohol.

What is "alcohol" ? is it an adjective ? or noun?
Why we use S in this example "alcohol's effect"
Here is the some sentences:
Alcohol intake may vary from person to person.
Alcohol's effect on women is much more visible.

Testosterone level is crucial for men's health.

Coffee smell brought back Mrs Suzy to her office.

Child abuse in against children's rights while woman abuse is against women's rights.

When we have to use the S ? and when whe don't have to ?

Child, woman, coffee, alcohol are not adjectives, and yet they are used without the possesif S, why ?

AlpheccaStars · Accepted Answer

austere125riversWe say "alcohol intake" even without using the S in the end of alcohol.
What is "alcohol" ? is it an adjective ? or noun?

Both. It is a noun adjunct.

Here are some sentences:
Alcohol intake may vary from person to person. OK
Alcohol's effect on women is much more visible.OK

Testosterone level is crucial for men's health. OK

The smell of coffee brought Mrs Suzy back to her office.

Coffee smells brought Mrs Suzy back to her office.

Child abuse is against children's rights while wife abuse is against women's rights.

The usage of noun adjuncts versus possessive versus compound noun is idiomatic, and part of language evolution.

For example, I hear "wife abuse" and "child abuse" in the context of family relations, but the more general "woman abuse" sounds odd to me.

I would write "abuse of women."

Austere125rivers · Answer

Thank you,

I would like to know if there are any grammatical rules to follow or not.

Because "woman abuse" "child abuse" "coffee smell" "testo levels" are correct and used a lot by famous authors.

I feel like there is a lot of problem in Enlgish grammar. English grammar is incorrect itslef.

AlpheccaStars · Answer

austere125riversI would like to know if there are any grammatical rules to follow or not.

There are not any hard and fast rules that I have heard. It is just a matter of convention, and noun adjuncts are quite commonplace. Generally, a material substance can be used as a noun adjunct: stone wall, wool sweater, brick house, wood deck, feather duster etc. Noun adjuncts are common in food dishes: chicken and rice soup, pork sausage, honey mustard, etc. and in functional descriptions: water tower, milk bottle, and flag pole.

English tends to be a very flexible language, where a single word can be used as more than one part of speech. For example, the word "round" can be a noun, adjective, preposition, verb, or adverb. The identification of part of speech in a particular sentence is determined by inflection (in the case of verbs), function, and word order.

The language is constantly changing, especially in vocabulary. Also, there are many dialects of English with a variety of different grammatical structures.

"alcohol intake" and "alcohol's effect" ?

We say "alcohol intake" even without using the S in the end of alcohol.

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