The Causative

We use causative verbs when we want to talk about something that another person has done for us or for another person. This means that the subject performed the action, but did not do it himself. Maybe they paid, demanded, or convinced the other person to do it.

We can use the causative in the following ways:

- Normally we use 'do something' when we talk about paying someone to do something for us. Often used for services. The form is 'subject + have + object + past participle'

- We can also use "subject + get + object + past participle". It has the same meaning as 'have', but is less formal.

- You could also use the construction 'get + someone + to + infinitive' Once again, this means that you encourage other people to take action, perhaps by paying them to do it, asking them to do it, or convincing them to do it.

- We can also use the construction 'subject + have + person + infinitive'. This is very similar to the meaning of "to do something" that we already talked about, but this time we are talking about who did it: we are talking about the person we asked to do it for us.