all the attention from their parents vs all of their parents' attention

English grammar questions, answered by Alan

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ansonman
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all the attention from their parents vs all of their parents' attention

Post by ansonman »

I have made up (1) below.

(1) Jack is jealous that Jim always gets all of their parents' attention.

My non-native English speaking friends' revision is (2) below.

(2) Jack is jealous that Jim always gets all the attention from their parents.

I don't understand why my phrase in bold is wrong. My friends think it makes my sentence sound confusing. Please help me. Thank you very much.
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Alan
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Re: all the attention from their parents vs all of their parents' attention

Post by Alan »

#1 is not wrong, and, since it is generally understood that people have no more than 2 parents, not even potentially confusing.

However, if in some specific case there were any doubt regarding the number of parents, the sentence could be more precisely - if less felicitously - rephrased as follows:

Jack is jealous that Jim always gets all of the attention of both of their parents.
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