Let's take into consideration these examples:
Ta1 men dou1 bu4 xi3 huan1 wo3. They all dislike me.
Zhong1 guo2 de cheng2 shi4 dou1 hen3 da4. All the Chinese cities are big.
To my European brain "dou1" is a part of a subject. I see/ hear/ think:
Ta1 men dou1 --- bu4 xi3 huan1 --- wo3.
Zhong1 guo2 de --- cheng2 shi4 dou1 --- hen3 da4.
But when Chinese native speakers speak slowly, they never part sentences like this! For them "dou1" is a part of a verb... Which to me is extremely strange. They would say:
Ta1 men --- dou1 bu4 xi3 huan1 --- wo3.
Zhong1 guo2 [probably also "de" goes to "cheng2 shi4" here!] --- de cheng2 shi4 --- dou1 hen3 da4.
Is there an explainable reason of that? I can guess it has to do with another or archaic meaning/ use of "dou1".