PRESENT PERFECT CONTINUOUS
The present continuous perfect, often has the equivalence to the translation "to take + gerund" in Spanish, but the use of this form is more frequent in English. It is used for actions that have started in the past but continue in the present.
Grammatical Rules
Form
As in the present perfect, we use the auxiliary verb "to have" in addition to "been" (the past participle of the verb "to be") plus the verb + ing.
| Subject | Auxiliary | Verbo+ing |
|---|
| I, you, we, they | have been | talking, studying, waiting… |
| he, she, it | has been | talking, studying, waiting… |
Structure
1. Affirmative Sentences
Sujeto + verbo auxiliar (to have) + “been” + verbo+ing.
Examples:
| They have [They’ve] been talking for three hours. |
| She has [She’s] been studying English since she was 16. |
| I have [I’ve] been waiting for you for over an hour! |
2. Negative Sentences
Sujeto + verbo auxiliar (to have) + “not” + “been” + verbo+ing.
Examples:
| They haven’t been talking for more than a few minutes. |
| She hasn’t been studying English for very long. |
| Don’t worry, I haven’t been waiting long. |
3. Interrogative Sentences
Verbo auxiliar (to have) + sujeto + “been” + verbo+ing?
Examples:
| Have they been talking for a long time? |
| Have you been waiting long?
Use
We use this time when we want to express the sense of the continuity of an action that has begun in the past and that still lasts in the present or that has just ended.
We refer to something that we have been doing over a period of time, therefore, we use the prepositions of time "for" and "since".
If we use the present continuous perfect without a period of time, it means "lately" or "recently".
Example:
| I can’t believe it is still raining. It’s been raining for a week now! |
| John has been working at the bank since 2003. |
| We’ve been planning our vacation for over a month. |
| Amanda and Tom have been dating since last June. |
| He hasn’t been studying enough. |
| Have you been feeling ok lately? |
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