Korean subject honorifics: An experimental study

- A generational difference was noted in judgments of the subject honorific in Korean.
- Young participants were sensitive to the status of both the speaker and the hearer.
- The status of the speaker was the most important factor for our older group.

This paper seeks to shed light on the factors that contribute to the use of the Korean subject honorific -(u)si-a long-standing issue in the study of pragmatics and politeness in that language. We tested two groups of Korean speakers (younger versus older adults) on two patterns of honorification-(a) the classic pattern in which the referent of the subject outranks both the speaker and the hearer, and (b) the split pattern in which the referent of the subject outranks the speaker but not the hearer. In an online acceptability judgment task, younger participants (n = 40) showed a strong and quick preference for the use of -(u)si in the classic pattern, but manifested uncertainty in the split pattern. In contrast, older participants (n = 40) showed a significant preference for -(u)si in both the split pattern and the classic pattern when the referent of the subject outranks the speaker.