Structure
Verb[て]+ ほしい
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Standard
About てほしい
As mentioned in our lesson about 'saying that you want something' with がほしい, sometimes ほしい can be used as auxiliary adjective (an adjective that needs to be connected to another word in order to have meaning). In these cases, it will follow the conjunction particle, て. When used this way, てほしい expresses that the speaker 'wants somebody to do something'.
To use てほしい, simply change the verb that you 'want someone to do' into its て-form, and then add ほしい.
Caution
てほしい can also be used to ask questions/explain about what other people want you (or somebody else) to do. Due to this, we will need to be careful when trying to identify who wants who to do what.
Related
Examples
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車で来てほしかった。
I wanted you to come by car.
コーラを買ってほしいです。
I want you to buy (me) a cola.
一緒にサッカーをしてほしい。
I want you to play soccer with me.
一緒に食べに行ってほしいんです。
I want you to go out to eat with me.
毎日お弁当を作ってほしいです。
I want you to make me a bento every day.
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…に…て欲しい: To Want Someone to Do Something
TalkInJapan
ほしい vs. てもらいたい
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[DBJG] A Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar
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Genki II 1st Edition
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てほしい – Grammar Discussion
Most Recent Replies (9 in total)
Pushindawood
I want you to
Structure
- Verb[ て ] + ほしい
[てほしい is used for when you want someone else to do something]
[たい is used when the speaker wants to do something or the speaker is speaking from someone else’s point of view ]View on Bunpro
ulurujamman
Can you use してもらいたい to the same effect?
mrnoone
@ulurujamman
Hey and welcome on the community forums Sorry for the extremely slow answer
Yes, you can express the same idea using てもらいたい.
It will have the same meaning, but will be more indirect and therefore more polite. Plus, てほしい is used MUCH more often than てもらいたい.
You can make it even less direct by using てもらいたいんですが(and not finishing the sentence), it will make it into a more hesitant request.When you want to make a more humble request, when speaking to superior and the like you can use ていただきたいです (or again, ていただきたいんですが)
I hope it helps,
Cheers!Melanthe
In this question:
コーラを ________ です。[買う]
I want you to buy [me] a cola.Why is かってくれてほしい not correct?
CrisH
I basically came to ask the same thing, though I was going to also ask whether
コーラを かってほしい です。
specifically implies the “me” in “I want you to buy me a cola”, or if that’s just the most likely intent without any additional context, as I’d have read that as plain old “I want you to buy a cola”.matt_in_mito
This is basically right. In most situations, the listener would assume you meant them, assuming there is no additional context. If you were specifically talking about someone else prior to that, then that could change the context.
siditious
I also want to add that it seems that 作ってくれて 欲しい seems like the correct response, 作って欲しい would be “I want you to make a bento everyday” and does not clearly indicate the verb of giving.
nekoyama
て・くれる is not used with て・欲しい.
I’ve seen constructions like 作って渡して欲しい to say “I want you to make it and hand it over”, but the English sentences for this grammar point don’t say that.
supakaloru
hey guys, was learning about this grammar point.
I have a question for this sentence: 手伝ってほしいの?
It’s translated as “Do you want me to help you?”
While the grammar point mentioned that てほしい means “want somebody to do something”. Hence, won’t the above sentence be translated into “Do I want you to help me?”While “Do you want me to help you?” would be “手伝いたがる?”
casual
手伝ってほしいの? without additional context indeed means “Do you want me to help you?”
Perhaps a useful way to think about it is that in questions frame of reference generally flips from speaker to listener. And so in questions people will fill in the blanks of missing topic, subject, object differently.
Let’s look at some examples:行く
(I will) go (there)
行く?
(Will you) go (there)?手伝いたい
(I) want to help (you, or somebody else we were just talking about)
手伝いたい?
(Do you) want to help (me, or somebody else we were just talking about)?手伝ってほしい
(I) want you to help (me, or somebody else)
手伝ってほしい?
(Do you) want me to help (you, or somebody else)?手伝いたがる
(You, or somebody else) look like you want to help (somebody, maybe me)
手伝いたがる?
Do (I, or somebody else) look like I want to help (somebody)?So...
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