flight attendant(s)

If you see anything suspicious on the plane, please inform a flight attendant/the flight attendants. Either option ok. You'll be telling one individual one but they'll pass the news on to the rest.

the flight attendant - this suggests there is only one on the plane.

Thanks Nona. I wonder why "the flight attendants" is correct. It sounds like the person has to inform a few flight attendants. Unless in this context, flight attendants are treated as one group/team of people. Is that true?

Yes, I think so. In the same way as 'the football team' or 'the staff of the company'.

Hello all,

I read from another post that we use singular to refer to the group of subjects, the sentence is

"The whale is the largest mammal in the world."

NOT "The whales are the largest mammal in the world."

Therefore, we should use "the flight attendant" to mean that the person can approach any one of the flight attendants availab

Hi Cogar

In this case "Please inform the flight attendant" simply makes it sound as though there is only one flight attendant on the plane.

Cogar,

Your sentence applies to all the whales in the world.

This one only applies to the flight attendents on the plane.

If we wanted to make a comment about all the flight attendents in the world we could say 'The flight attendent is a hard-working person'.

You can only use the single form for a group when you mean absolutely ALL of them.