This paper investigates the distribution of a morphological variable that has not gained much attention in the literature: adverbial -s versus -Ø. This morpheme predominantly occurs with adverbs ending in -ward(s), like forward(s), afterward(s), and inward(s), or -way(s), such as anyway(s) or halfway(s). Using a large database of sociolinguistic interviews of Ontario English and an apparent-time perspective, we show that the use of the variants changes over the twentieth century, with the adverbial suffixes -ward(s) and -way(s) behaving differently. -Ward(s) shows a trend towards -s, while most words in -way(s) increasingly take -Ø–splitting by adverbial suffix. Anyway(s) is an exception to this pattern, with a change from below towards -s, strongly conditioned by social standing. We also find evidence for lexicalization of forms without -s in phrasal verbs like to move forward. We explain these findings against the background of variationist sociolinguistic theory and principles of language change.

中文翻译：

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带有-ward(s)的新-way(s)：词汇化、分裂和社会语言模式

本文研究了一个在文献中没有引起太多关注的形态变量的分布：状语-s与 -Ø。这个语素主要出现在以-病房， 喜欢向前，之后，和向内，要么-方法）， 这样的无论如何要么中途. 使用安大略英语社会语言访谈的大型数据库和表观时间视角，我们表明变体的使用在 20 世纪发生了变化，副词后缀-病房和-方法）表现不同。-病房呈现出趋向-s, 而大多数词在-方法）越来越多地采用-Ø——被状语后缀分割。无论如何）是这种模式的一个例外，从下到-s，强烈地受社会地位的制约。我们还发现了形式词汇化的证据-s在短语动词中前进`. 我们在变异社会语言学理论和语言变化原则的背景下解释了这些发现。