Conditional Mood
From TEFL World Wiki
The conditional mood is the form of the verb used in conditional sentences to refer to a hypothetical situation or an uncertain event that is dependent on another set of circumstances.
In expressing a conditional situation, we must be able to distinguish between what is a factual statement and what is a hypothetical statement. In English, there are three types of conditional sentences:
- Factual - When I feel upset, I don’t eat.
- Predictive – If I feel upset, I will not eat.
- Speculative – If I were to feel upset, I would not eat.
The conditional mood can be expressed in several tenses:
- Simple - I would cook
- Progressive or Continuous - I would be cooking
- Perfect - I would have cooked
- Perfect progressive or continuous - I would have been cooking
The conditional is used to form the following types of sentences:
