～がる: How to Say Someone "Shows Signs of" a Feeling in Japanese

In Japanese, がる is a productive suffix, meaning one you can use with many words. It attaches to a feeling adjective and turns it into a verb meaning "shows signs of feeling X."¹² It is the usual tool for describing how someone else feels, because Japanese normally does not flatly assert another person's inner state.¹

Overview

What ～がる does

～がる (garu) attaches to the stem of a feeling or sensation adjective. It also attaches to the desiderative auxiliaries, or "want" forms, たい and ほしい. The result is a verb that means "shows signs of feeling X" or "behaves as if X."¹² The feeling stops being a private internal state and becomes an observable behavior the speaker can point to.

デジタル大辞泉 defines the 接尾語 (suffix) がる with two senses. First, it means 「そのように思う、そう感じる」 and showing that thought or feeling 「態度・表情・動作に表す」 ("through attitude, expression, or action"). Second, it means 「そのように振る舞う、そのようなふりをする」 ("behaving that way or putting on such an appearance").² Its examples include 寒がる, めずらしがる, 不思議がる, 偉がる, 強がる, and 得意がる.²

The canonical pedagogical set is the sensation and emotion verbs: 寒がる ("shows signs of feeling cold"), 怖がる ("shows signs of being afraid"), 痛がる ("shows signs of being in pain"), and 寂しがる ("shows signs of feeling lonely").³⁴

子供こどもは注射ちゅうしゃを痛いたがった。¹⁵
"The child winced at the injection."

Han's corpus study states the meaning precisely: ～がる expresses that the speaker takes the external signs a person shows, relates them to that person's inner state, and describes those signs as a manifestation of that inner state.¹

隣となりの人ひとがしきりに寒さむがっている。¹
"The person next to me keeps acting cold."

Why Japanese needs ～がる: you can't assert someone else's feelings

～がる is fundamentally a third-person device. Han's analysis rests on a simple premise: a speaker has no direct access to another person's inner state and can only describe its outward signs (外的な様子). That is exactly what ～がる lexicalizes, or encodes in the word itself.¹

Learner references state the practical rule plainly: in Japanese you normally do not assert how someone else feels unless they have told you directly. ～がる reports the version inferred from behavior instead.⁶⁷

Why the suffix exists at all

Tae Kim frames the logic directly: ～がる "is simply an observation based on some type of sign(s). Therefore, you would not use it for your own emotions since guessing about your own emotions is not necessary."⁷

For the first person, use the bare adjective. You state your own 寒い, 怖い, or ほしい directly because you have direct access to your own feelings. Inferring your own emotion from a "sign" is unnecessary.⁷⁸ The narrow exceptions are covered under "First person vs third person" below.

私わたしは寂さびしい。/ 彼かれは寂さびしがっている。¹⁷
"I'm lonely." / "He seems lonely, from how he's acting."

Where it sits in the JLPT (N3, often listed at N4)

The JLPT does not publish an official grammar list, so placement depends on reference works. Those works disagree. This article keeps a canonical N3 home, but nearly every learner reference lists plain ～がる and ～たがる at N4: Bunpro,⁶ JLPT Sensei,³ Migaku,⁹ and Tofugu.⁴¹⁰ The academic literature treats ～がる as intermediate grammar and assigns no JLPT band at all.¹

The N3 vs N4 split is real and worth knowing. No source places ～がる at N5. The field consensus sits at N4, while this curriculum files it one level up at N3.

Register is neutral and everyday. ～がる appears across newspaper prose, fiction, and casual writing in the corpus data, with no marked formality restriction.¹

Form and conjugation

The attachment rule: adjective stem + がる

For an い-adjective, drop the final い and add がる: 寒い → 寒がる, 怖い → 怖がる, 痛い → 痛がる, 寂しい → 寂しがる, and 嬉しい → 嬉しがる.²³⁴

For a な-adjective (形容動詞), attach がる to the stem without な: 不思議（な）→ 不思議がる, 嫌（な）→ 嫌がる, and 残念（な）→ 残念がる.²³ Han's corpus confirms 嫌, 不思議, 残念, 気の毒, 不安, 迷惑, and 面倒 among the attested がる bases.¹

Which adjectives qualify? In general, they are adjectives naming a feeling or sensation that arises when a person comes into contact with something. Han states the unifying property as adjectives that 「人がある物に接触した場合またはある事柄に遭遇した際，その場で生じる感情・感覚を表す」 ("express an emotion or sensation that arises on the spot when a person contacts an object or encounters a situation").¹

彼かれは負まけて残念ざんねんがっている。³
"He looks disappointed at having lost."

みんな最初さいしょはマイクを持もつのを嫌いやがっていた。¹
"At first everyone was reluctant to hold the mic."

～がる conjugates as a 五段 verb

Once formed, ～がる inflects exactly like any 五段 (godan, う-verb) verb. デジタル大辞泉 labels the suffix's conjugation 「動詞五（四）段型活用」 (conjugating on the five-step pattern).² This is the key contrast with the source adjective. 寒い conjugates as an adjective (寒くない, 寒かった), but 寒がる conjugates as a verb (寒がらない, 寒がった).²

Form	怖がる	Source adjective 怖い
Dictionary	怖こわがる	怖こわい
Negative	怖こわがらない	怖こわくない
Past	怖こわがった	怖こわかった
Te-form	怖こわがって	怖こわくて
Conditional	怖こわがれば	怖こわければ

Han's corpus attests the negative (がらない / がらず), base (がる), past (がった), conditional (がれば / がったら), and renyōkei, or continuative-stem, forms (がり / がって / がったり). It also attests the passive がられる, causative がらせる, and potential がれる.¹

No imperative, no volitional

Han found no corpus examples of the imperative (がれ) or volitional (がろう). That fits the meaning: you cannot command someone, or resolve yourself, to "show signs of" a feeling.¹

子供こどもが嫌いやがらないように、ゆっくり説明せつめいした。¹
"I explained slowly so the child wouldn't balk."

弟おとうとは注射ちゅうしゃを痛いたがって泣ないた。¹
"My little brother cried, wincing at the shot."

～がっている for an ongoing observed state

Plain ～がる reports a habitual tendency or a general, repeated disposition. ～がっている reports a state being observed right now or, in the past tense, at that time. JLPT Sensei frames the split as がる ("he is generally afraid of dogs") versus がっている ("he is currently showing signs of being afraid").³

This matches the corpus. Han documents ～がっている and ～がっていた alongside ～がる and ～がった as standard inflections. Speakers use these forms when they report the signs as an ongoing observed situation.¹ Tofugu notes that ～がる is often used in the continuous form because the suffix reports an observed, in-progress state.⁴

子供こどもが犬いぬを怖こわがっている。³¹
"The child is scared of the dog right now."

卒業生そつぎょうせいはかつての担任たんにんの先生せんせいをしきりに懐なつかしがった。¹
"The graduates kept reminiscing fondly about their old homeroom teacher."

たがる and ほしがる: ～がる on the desire words

～たい + がる → ～たがる

～たがる is simply ～がる applied to the desiderative auxiliary ～たい, the "want to do" form. Because ～たい is itself an い-adjective in form, you drop its い and add がる: 食べたい → 食べたがる, 行きたい → 行きたがる.¹⁰¹

It carries the same observable-sign logic. It reports a third party's apparent desire to do something, inferred from behavior rather than from a stated wish. Maggie Sensei puts it directly: たい expresses one's desire verbally, while たがる describes a third person's desires, which are not always expressed verbally but can be inferred from behavior.⁸ The ～たがっている form is the ongoing-observed counterpart, parallel to がっている.¹⁰

子供こどもは早はやくゲームをしたがる。¹
"The kid is itching to play games."

田中たなかさんは車くるまを買かいたがっている。³
"Tanaka seems to want to buy a car."

ほしい + がる → ほしがる, and the が→を object shift

ほしがる is ～がる on the い-adjective ほしい: drop い, add がる. It reports someone else's apparent want for an object.²⁴

The big structural consequence is the が→を object shift. With ほしい and with ～たい, the wanted thing is marked with が: おもちゃがほしい, 水が飲みたい.¹¹¹² But ほしがる and ～たがる are verbs, not adjectives. The wanted object therefore shifts back to the ordinary direct-object particle を: おもちゃを欲しがる, 水を欲しがる, パンを食べたがる.⁴¹⁰¹¹

The descriptive grammar treats が-marking on ほしい and たい objects as a property of the desiderative adjective construction. When the predicate becomes a verb, the object takes the standard transitive を.¹¹¹²

A one-line rule for the shift

Tofugu states it operationally: when describing someone else's feelings with ～がる, use を in the place where you would use が in a sentence about your own feelings.⁴

子供こどもがおもちゃを欲ほしがる。⁴¹¹
"The kid wants the toy, you can see it."

弟おとうとはずっと水みずを欲ほしがっていた。⁴¹¹
"My little brother kept wanting water the whole time."

あの犬いぬはいつもパンを食たべたがる。¹⁰
"That dog always wants bread."

Nuance and usage contexts

First person vs third person

The default is simple: use the bare adjective for yourself (私は寒い), and がる for others (彼は寒がっている).⁷¹ This follows directly from the meaning. ～がる describes externally observed signs, and you do not observe your own feelings as external signs.¹

The narrow first-person cases arise when the speaker treats the self as an object of observation. This can happen when narrating a past self as if from outside, or when describing a character in fiction or reportage by observable behavior. JLPT Sensei notes that it is acceptable to use it for yourself in some situations,³ and Han's corpus contains exactly such a first-person example.¹

妹いもうとは暗くらい部屋へやを怖こわがる。¹
"My little sister is scared of dark rooms."

写真しゃしんを飾かざって、朝夕あさゆう眺ながめ懐なつかしがっている。¹
"I keep the photo up and gaze at it morning and night, full of nostalgia."

What the "sign" implies: behavior, not telepathy

～がる reports a feeling inferred from outward behavior. It does not assert the feeling as known fact. Han's central claim is that the speaker relates the person's 外的な様子 (external signs: words spoken, movements, facial expressions, attitude) to an inferred inner state.¹

The signs tend to cluster. Han documents that ～がる typically appears when the person repeatedly shows a particular sign. It also appears when the sign departs from their usual self, from the people around them, or from people in general.¹ This is why ～がる often appears with accompanying te-forms, quotation, cause clauses, and degree or frequency adverbs.¹

Because ～がる keeps the other person's inner state at an observer's distance, it can frame behavior as departing from the norm. With certain bases, it can sound slightly detached or even critical. デジタル大辞泉's second sense, 「そのように振る舞う、そのようなふりをする」 ("behaving that way, putting on such an appearance"), is exactly this evaluative reading. The dictionary's own examples for it are 強がる ("put on a brave face"), 偉がる ("act self-important"), and 得意がる ("act smug").²

欲しがる can carry a judgment

The same suffix that neutrally reports 寒がる can, with the right base, carry a "they are making a show of it" tone. 欲しがる in particular can read as "greedily" or "conspicuously" wanting, a tone the neutral adjective ほしい does not have.²

彼かれはいつもお金かねを欲ほしがる。²
"He's always after money."

子供こどものくせに強つよがるな。²
"Don't act tough, you're just a kid."

加奈子かなこは表面上ひょうめんじょうは悲かなしがっていた。¹
"On the surface, Kanako was acting grief-stricken."

Which adjectives take がる, and which don't

The yes list includes emotion adjectives (嬉しがる, 悲しがる, 寂しがる, 怖がる, 嫌がる, 残念がる) and sensation adjectives (痛がる, 寒がる, 暑がる, 痒がる, 眩しがる).¹ Han's corpus yielded 60 emotion adjectives and 7 sensation adjectives taking がる.¹

The no list, as a rule, consists of objective-property adjectives. These name a static external property rather than a felt reaction, such as 赤い ("red"), 高い ("tall" or "expensive"), and 親切な ("kind").¹ An adjective that fails the "私は――" emotion-sentence test does not take がる. A flat property like 赤い cannot become a feeling, so 部屋が赤がる ("the room shows signs of being red") is ungrammatical and never occurs.

There is a gray zone. A minority of attribute adjectives (新しい, 強い, 珍しい, 汚い, 厄介な) do take がる in the corpus. But they do so only when they name a momentary psychological reaction to encountering something, not a static property.¹

この子こは新あたらしいものを珍めずらしがる。¹
"This child is fascinated by new things."

Good to know

The ～がり personality-trait noun (寒がり, 怖がり, 恥ずかしがり)

The renyōkei (連用形, the "stem" inflection) of a ～がる verb can be reanalyzed as a noun naming a person prone to feeling X. デジタル大辞泉 lists 「がり」 as a noun-form variant with the examples 暑がり and 怖がり.²

Common examples include 寒がり ("someone who feels the cold easily"), 暑がり ("someone who feels heat easily"), 怖がり ("a fearful, easily-scared person"), 恥ずかしがり ("a shy person"), and 寂しがり ("someone who dislikes being alone").⁸² These often take ～屋 to name the person type more strongly: 恥ずかしがり屋, 寂しがり屋.⁸

私わたしは寒さむがりだから、冬ふゆが苦手にがてだ。⁸
"I feel the cold easily, so I'm not good with winter."

The trait noun describes a stable disposition, so 私は寒がりだ is fine for the first person, even though the verb 私は寒がる is not.

Don't use がる for your own present feeling

The most common learner error is using ～がる for the speaker's own current feeling. 私は寒がる, intended to mean "I'm cold," is wrong because ～がる reports externally observed signs and is third-person by default. State your own present feeling with the bare adjective.¹⁷

私わたしは寒さむい。⁷
"I'm cold."

The trait noun is a separate matter: 私は寒がりだ ("I feel the cold easily") is fine, because it names a stable disposition rather than a present feeling.²⁸

Mnemonic: がる makes a feeling into something you can watch

Treat the adjective as the feeling and がる as the visible doing of the feeling. 寒い is the cold you feel. 寒がる is the shivering, the hugging-yourself, the "it's freezing" behavior someone else does that lets you infer the cold.¹

The suffix turns an inner state you can only feel into an outer behavior you can watch. That is exactly why it is third-person. This maps onto デジタル大辞泉's first sense: showing the feeling 「態度・表情・動作に表す」 ("through attitude, expression, or action").²

Why がる can mean "pretend": the two senses share one root

The detached-tone verbs 強がる, 偉がる, and 得意がる do not use a different がる. デジタル大辞泉 lists them under the same 接尾語 (suffix) entry as sense 2: 「そのように振る舞う、そのようなふりをする」 ("behaving that way, putting on such an appearance").²

Knowing that the suffix spans both "show real signs of X" and "put on a show of X" explains why 欲しがる can sound either neutral or faintly critical, depending on context.²

See also

• Japanese Emotions and Feelings Vocabulary: 嬉しい, 悲しい, and the ～がる Third-Person Rule
• The ～げ Suffix: How to Say Someone "Looks / Seems" a Feeling in Japanese (悲しげ, 楽しげ)
• ～そうだ (Appearance): How to Say "Looks Like…" in Japanese
• The ～っぽい Suffix: How to Say "-ish / Has the Qualities Of" in Japanese (子供っぽい, 忘れっぽい)
• The ～らしい Suffix: How to Say "Typical of X" in Japanese (男らしい, 自分らしい)

References

Footnotes

1. 韓金柱 (Han Geumju). 「現代日本語における『～がる』の統語的な特徴」. 『コーパスに基づく言語学教育研究報告』No.8, 東京外国語大学, 2012, pp. 153–164. https://cblle.tufs.ac.jp/assets/files/publications/working_papers_08/section/153-164.pdf (corpus-based study drawing on NINJAL's BCCWJ monitor data and the Asahi Shimbun online article database 聞蔵). ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸ ↩⁹ ↩¹⁰ ↩¹¹ ↩¹² ↩¹³ ↩¹⁴ ↩¹⁵ ↩¹⁶ ↩¹⁷ ↩¹⁸ ↩¹⁹ ↩²⁰ ↩²¹ ↩²² ↩²³ ↩²⁴ ↩²⁵ ↩²⁶ ↩²⁷ ↩²⁸ ↩²⁹ ↩³⁰ ↩³¹ ↩³² ↩³³ ↩³⁴ ↩³⁵ ↩³⁶ ↩³⁷ ↩³⁸

2. デジタル大辞泉 (Shogakukan). Entry for the 接尾語「がる」. Consulted via Weblio 辞書. https://www.weblio.jp/content/%E3%81%8C%E3%82%8B ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸ ↩⁹ ↩¹⁰ ↩¹¹ ↩¹² ↩¹³ ↩¹⁴ ↩¹⁵ ↩¹⁶ ↩¹⁷ ↩¹⁸ ↩¹⁹

3. JLPT Sensei. "がる・がっている (garu/gatteiru)." https://jlptsensei.com/learn-japanese-grammar/%E3%81%8C%E3%82%8B-garu-%E3%81%8C%E3%81%A3%E3%81%A6%E3%81%84%E3%82%8B-gatteiru-meaning/ (limitation: SEO learning site; used only for JLPT-field placement and example glosses). ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸ ↩⁹

4. Tofugu. "Japanese い-Adjective がる." https://www.tofugu.com/japanese-grammar/i-adjective-garu/ (limitation: learning publisher, not a primary source). ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸ ↩⁹

5. 国立国語研究所 (NINJAL). 『現代日本語書き言葉均衡コーパス』(BCCWJ). https://clrd.ninjal.ac.jp/bccwj/ (the balanced corpus from which ¹ draws its attested examples). ↩

6. Bunpro. "がる (JLPT N4)." https://bunpro.jp/grammar_points/%E3%81%8C%E3%82%8B (limitation: SEO learning site; used only for JLPT-field placement). ↩ ↩²

7. Tae Kim. "Showing signs of something." Tae Kim's Guide to Japanese Grammar. https://www.guidetojapanese.org/learn/grammar/signs (limitation: independent learner reference, not a primary linguistics source). ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷

8. Maggie Sensei. "〜たい ＆ がる and 〜がり." https://maggiesensei.com/2013/01/15/ (limitation: independent learner blog; used only for the がり personality-noun and first/third-person framing). ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶

9. Migaku. "「がる」 Someone Shows Signs of Something." https://migaku.com/grammar/japanese/garu-someone-shows-signs-something (limitation: SEO learning site; used only for JLPT-field placement). ↩

10. Tofugu. "Japanese Verb たがる Form." https://www.tofugu.com/japanese-grammar/tagaru-form/ (limitation: learning publisher, not a primary source). ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵

11. 日本語記述文法研究会編. 『現代日本語文法2 第3部 格と構文・第4部 ヴォイス』. くろしお出版, 2009 (reference grammar; the standard descriptive treatment of case marking with desiderative predicates, cited in ¹). ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵

12. Makino, Seiichi, and Michio Tsutsui. A Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar. The Japan Times, 1989. Entries on 「ほしい」 and 「たい」 (the が/を object-marking alternation with desiderative predicates). ↩ ↩²